^LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.? 






I UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.^ 



JUSTIFICATION 



OF 



. 1 



FROM A CHARGE OF 



CONSPIRACY; 



EXHIBITED AGAINST HIM BY THE 



IMPERIAL REPUBLICK OF FRANCE, 



Translated by Geo. L. Gray. 



NORFOLK : 
Printed and Published at the Office ©f the Publick Ledger, 

1804-, 



PREFACE. 



Among the many persecutions of innocence which have arisen 
from, and attended the progress of, the French Revolution, froni 
the murder of the royal family to the present day, there has not one 
occurred which has excited such general sympathy as that of the 
celebrated, the brave, and the patriotick general Moreau. During 
a period of time, and in a nation, which seemed to regard a total 
renunciation of all the milder characteristicks of humanity as the 
nearest approach to perfectibility ; in which men appeared to con- 
tend for pre-eminence in barbarity ; in which the honours of the 
legislator, the magistrate, and the soldier, were crimsoned with 
the blood flowing from the harmless victims of fanaticism or rapa- 
city ; in which all sought for power only to excel their predecessors 
in the abuse of it ; Moreau, like a comet, pursued the eccentrick 
march of probity, honour, and virtue. The career of his life has 
not been rendered more glorious by the splendour of his military 
achievements, than singularby the generosity of his nature, and the 
disinterestedness of his publick services. 

That such a man, v/ho, in every station, seemed to hold himself 
in estimation only in proportion to the good he could render to his 
country, should, after a series of the most brilliant services, be- 
come the object of a prosecution on a charge of treason, at first 
excited the wonder, and has ended in fixing the indignation, of the 
world. 

The events which have recently taken place in France, have, to 
every person of the least discernment, fully explained the motive of 
this no less extraordinary than unjust proceeding : the whole detail 
of which has only served to establish the innocence of the accused ; 
and the criminality of his accuser. 

Moreau was a real republican ; he had fought to establish the 
liberties of France, on a rational and secure basis. He had 
seen and mourned the ravages which the struggles of successive 
parties had occasioned in his distracted country. He knew that 
the sources of those disorders were in the imbecility of the govern- 
ment ; and the only part he ever took in civil affairs was when he 
endeavoured to remedy this radical evil. It was with the hope of 
effecting a good so desirable, that he voluntarily assisted, on the 
18th Brumaire, to place Buonaparte in that situation which he no- 
bly rejected when offered to himself. Pleased with his work, he 



iv PREFACE. 

lent it his cordial support, and at the head of the chief army of the 
nation, was, in a great degree, the insttument that accomplished 
its lirm establishment. 

So long as Buonaparte was contented with the power thus con- 
ferred upon him, and rendered legitimate by its necessity, so long- 
did he cultivate a good understanding with Moreau, consider him 
as his best friend, and invest him with the only authority of which 
he would accept. But the moment other projects of ambition en- 
tered his mind, conscious of their unworthiness, and that they 
never could receive the sanction of the general, he began to vrev/ 
him with jealousy, to listen to and encourage every rumour to his 
prejudice, and finally withdrew from him entirely. Under these 
auspices, and taking advantage of a moment of popular enthusiasm, 
the change in the duration of the consulate was effected, and 
Buonaparte was declared consul for life, with the right of naming 
his successor, and with other privileges and powers never contem- 
plate^d in his original appointment. Still Moreau, however he 
might disapprove of the measure, made no opposition ; from which 
he must have been deterred by his love of retirement, by consi- 
dering the change as not of importance enough to authorise his 
interference, or, what is not improbable, from a consideration that 
the power of the consul v/as now so confirmed, that to oppose it, 
Vv^ould only be to expose his own life, without the chance of pre~ 
venting the encroachment upon the liberty he loved. 

One degree of power successfully acquired in opposition to law, 
and in contempt of the rights of others, but stimulates to further 
attempts of the same nature. It is not therefore surprising that, 
possessing so much, Buonaparte should desire still more. There 
is but one limit to ambition ; that is when it has nothing more to 
acquire. Fortunate in accomplishing his purposes, beyond what 
could at any time have been his expectations ; possessing a power 
every way incompatible with the principles upon which the French 
revolution had been predicated, and directly contradicting all his 
own professions ; but one step removed from the highest authori- 
t}'^ acknowledged ; yet the ambition of Buonaparte could not be 
satiated until that authority should be attained. 

It was an attempt full of hazard ; but the danger that threatened 
it could only proceed from- virtue. The many declarations of the 
French against royalty, under any form, stared him in the face in 
ten thousand shapes ; but these were only words and could easily 
be erased. That veteran army which had so repeatedly, on the 
field of battle, sworn eternal hatred to monarchy, still existed. 
The general who had so often conducted that army to victory, and 
saved it from destruction, still lived •,^ lived in the hearts of the 
soldiers ; surrounded by all the splendour of his former actions, 
untarnished by even one ambitious thought, or a single action 



PREFACE. V 

unworthy of the patriot. He had, it v/as imagined, relunctantly, 
submitted to former usurpations ; the present would perhaps ex- 
haust his patience, and rouse all his civick virtues. His name was 
terrible to the consul ; it was adored by the army and people. 
Moreau, must, therefore, either be gained over, or deprived of 
the power of opposition. 

The latter course only remained. He was not to be corrupted, 
but he was mortal. Even in this country we are not ignorant of 
what malice and defamation will attempt against the purest repu- 
tation, when urged by ambition. For a considerable time the 
ministerial prints in France were in the habit of uttering hints and 
suspicisns concerning Moreau, till at last the publick mind becama 
prepared for something ; and, the other schemes being matured, 
those inuendos changed their shape, and assumed the positive cha- 
racter of accusations. The friend of his country was arrested ; 
the Senatus-Consultum was promulgated ; Buonaparte was declar- 
ed Emperour ; and Moreau was arraigned as a criminal. 

It is worthy of remark that general Moreau was not brought to 
trial until the usurpation had been completed, and Buonaparte had 
been fixed on the pinnacle to which his guilty wishes had long 
pointed. It is not less worthy of notice, that, during the time the 
change of government was in agitation, so much vv^as his influence 
dreaded that all communication with him v/as denied, lest his 
opinions might, by some means or other, get abroad. That, in 
the mean time, every method which ingenuity could devise, was 
employed to blacken his reputation, particularly with the army, 
vfhere those very officers who had so often been led to conquest, and 
preserved from ruin, by the resources of his genius, scrupled not 
with base ingratitude, and the more base because coupled with in- 
justice, to pronounce him guilty of the highest crime recognized 
by the laws of any country. It was necessary by such acts to per- 
suade the army that he was unworthy of its confidence, before he 
could be deprived of it. They succeeded for the moment ; but 
the delusion either is, or must soon be, dissipated. 

In the elevation of Buonaparte will be found the only source of 
Moreau's prosecution : in the conscience of Buonaparte will be 
read the only evidence of his guilt. That secret power told him 
that all good men must condemn his conduct ; and as one of those 
Moreau v^as well known to him. The issue of this trial certainly 
does not justify the slanders uttered against this general. Had any 
pretext been found he would have shared the fate of Georges. 
His innocence v/as manifest ; but the danger of his being at liberty | 
had not passed over, and though they dare not proceed so far as to 
inflict publick death, he was in confinement, and it was very easy 
to decree that he should remain there. 

This decree, hov/ever, we are told, has been reversed, and 



vi PREFACE. 

the general has been allowed to seek an asylum in this land of li- 
berty, and of peace, which extends its arms to receive and protect 
the persecuted of every country. That the mild and benevolent 
genius of our laws can afford security and the prospect of tranquillity 
and happiness to this general, perhaps the only one who passed 
through the French revolution untainted by crimes ; whose only 
view was his country's liberty and happiness ; ought to be a sub- 
ject of exultation and happiness to their citizens. That he comes 
here innocent of the only charges that have ever attempted to cloud 
his honour, is, and ought to be, rejoiced in. 

That he is innocent will be fully proven to all who attentively 
examine the following document, which was first delivered to the 
American reader through the medium of the Norfolk Gazette and 
Publick Ledger ; and now appears in its present form, not from 
any hope of emolument, none is expected, but to render it more 
permanent and easy of reference. The original is an unadorned 
argument ; the translation aims only at fidelity and perspicuity. 
Hoping that the general might be fortunate enough to arrive in the 
United States, the object of the translator was, and is, by publish- 
ing this memoir, to shew his innocence to those among whom he 
may be destined to pass the remainder of an unsullied life : and to 
present in the injustice of his persecution, a new mirrour, in which 
to contemplate the character of that man who is now the bugbear of 
the world ; and to gratify whose criminal ambition even a Moreau 
must be sacrificed. 



JUSTIFICATION OF MOREAU. 



ON the first knowledge of the arrest of General Moreau, and of 
the motives of that arrest, every mind was struck with profound 
consternation. 

They had cause for being so. He was either guilty, or he was 
innocent. 

Was he guilty ? What! Moreau I the modest soldier, who never 
aspired but at the head of armies, never seemed fotward but in the 
field of battle ; in all other situations distinguished from his 
fellow-citizens only by the simplicity of his manners ! Moreau I 
who had never been thought to possess a wish for personal eleva- 
tion ! whose mind never harboured the idea that his successes 
could open for him a road to power ; not even at those epochs 
when France, harrassed by the oscillations of weak governments, 
would have regarded his ambition as its greatest blessing ! This 
man, who, in the midst of his victories, was heard only to utter 
one wish, that, by speedily securing the independence of his coun- 
try, he might be restored to that privicy, whose delights, with 
those of glory, divided his heart, and were his only passions 1 
What 1 could that man so remarked for his moderation, who was 
a hero even amongst heroes, could he descend to become a traitor 
to that cause, and a conspirer against that government, which he 
had so long supported, so often defended ? The most brilliant and 
best established virtue is then become no more than a long and 
dastardly hypocrisy, if Moreau can be perfidious. 

Was he innocent ? V/hat then must we think of that govern- 
ment, till then so worthy of our confidence and love, which, 
departing at once from the respect it professed for individual liber- 
ty, threw ignominious chains upon one of its greatest warriours : 
recompensed by criminal accusations, a general, rendered sacred 
by the many eminent services which he has performed, by the many 
victories which he has gained, by the many civick crowns due to 
him for the preservation of entire armies, and for the vast territo- 
ries which he has annexed to the French Empire. What guarantee 
will vulgar citizens have against oppression, if one of the most 

illustrious but we stop. Such an idea would be 

too alarmino-.- — We must endeavour to repel it — —but, with ij, 



• [ 2 ] 

let us also banish the afflicting idea, that general Moreau could 
ever stain his laurels ! 

Moreau has not betrayed his glory — He is innocent. 

Nor has the government belied its justice — there was cause of 
alarm. 

Pvloreau, in his prison, will be found the same as in the midst 
of armies, the true friend of his country ; seeing only her, and 
always incapable of sacrificing his respect for the pubiick order, to 
any regard for his personal safety. 

Just towards himself, he has not neglected his own defence. 
Just towards the government that prosecuted him, he has openly 
acknowledged, that the measures of which he had become the 
object, were occasioned by suspicions that required to be immedi- 
ately destroyed. 

They either are, or ought to be, already dissipated. The circum- 
stances connected with this case, are now to be given, with sim- 
plicity, to the pubiick. We demand no indulgence for him j we 
ask for ourselves, only that attention which we can lay claim to 
by so many titles. 

For four months general Moreau has been denounced, by the 
pubiick reports of the Grand-Judge, by placards printed and affixed 
to pubiick places, by the orders of generals to their armies, and 
by addresses from all the constituted authorities, and from a great 
number of military corps. 

Doubtless all these productions of zeal, though perhaps a little 
irregular, attest a great and laudable attachment to the government. 
But they do not prove, and cannot be admitted to prove, any thing 
more. Above all they prove nothing against the accused. A per- 
son accused is not to be judged by generals : their condition 
itself declares against the idea that they are to direct criminal pro- 
ceedings. He is not to be judged by the ministers, nor by the 
placards, of the government ; there would then no longer be an 
independent judiciary. Nor is he to be judged by addresses ; vain 
echoes of parole charges of guiit, and whose signers, by their 
distance from the scene, and by their absolute defect of the quality 
of judging, are incapable of investigating the circumstances, or of 
examining the evidence, of the fact : these addresses evince the 
natural horrour which their authors, in common with others, have 
conceived for all crimes similar to that alleged ; but they do not 
announce, on the individual facts, a conviction, to form which all 
the necessary elements are wanting. 

Nevertheless, these orders, these placards, these reports, these 
addresses, all e^iist. They are in every journal, on every wall, 
in every hand. During four months France has resounded with 
them. During four months every voice that was heard, was heard 
against Moreau j not one has been raised in his favour, excent a 



[ 3 ] 

solitary cry from his generous brother. But he, all this time in 
prison, held in the most rigorous seclusion, denied all communi- 
cation with others, even refused the pixsence of his own family, 
and without one defender, was compelled to be silent, while uni- 
versally accused. He was not permitted to dissipate prejudices ia 
their birth, and before they should take root in the publick mind. 
He was not allowed to trace the charges against him singly, step 
by step, and before they had assembled into a mass. He was not 
at liberty to contradict the falsehoods rumoured against him, before 
they could establish themselves in some credulous imaginations j 
to correct malignant and erroneous irjterpretations of his actions, 
which it is always more easy to publish than to retract ; to remove 
wrong impressions for which self-love often secretly contends 
against conviction ; to explain such parts of his conduct as might 
be supposed to afford some pretence for those rash judgments, 
which are with difficulty banished from the mind when once enter- 
tained by it. In a word, all have had the power of accusing 
Moreau ; none, until this day, has had the means of defending 
him. Such we know is the consequence of all criminal proceed- 
ings ; but that does not make the evil, as applicable to him, any 
thing less. For who can be ignorant of the ravages which this con- 
cert of censuring voices may make in any reputation ; particularly 
in these times of political tempests, when so many have deserted 
their professions and their duties that all virtues have, naturally, 
become objects of suspicion. 

It is, then, no more than justice to hear, with a peculiar atten- 
tion, the defence of general Moreau. He asks to be heard, not 
only in the name of his services, but in the name of his innocence. 
He asks it under the influence of a consideration of importance to 
society, no less than the interests of each of its members. The 
example of general Moreau proves, but too well, one great truth : 
that among those whom Providence has condemned to live in an 
heroick, a brilliant, but a terrible age, when the human species, as 
if fatigued by repose, delivers itself at once' to universal disorder ; 
when the face of the earth is totally changed ; when society is sud- 
denly reversed ; v/hen empires are in a manner confounded ; when 
new thrones are erected as easily as old ones are overthrown ; 
when those who were yesterday surrounded by splendour, to-day 
languish in obscurity and wretchedness ; when, by the caprice of 
fortune, the most brilliant destinies, in the glance of an eye, be- 
come so forlorn and miserable as to be objects of compassion even 
to the most mortal enemy ; that in such times, there is no man 
can one day assure himself that on the next he may not appear on 
the list of accused, and be arraigned as a traitor. 

Let each, then, turn his contemplation upon himself ; let him 
banish, by a just exertion of egotism, every prejudice which might 

B 



[ 4 ] 

have arisen in his mind during the forced silence of the accused ; 
let him forget every thing which has deviated from the true path 
of justice ; or rather let him remember all, that he may be provid- 
ed with strength to combat the impressions which might have been 
created by such irregular means. Let him come to the defence 
unprejudiced by the accusation ; and let him consider it with that 
respect for presumptive innocence, with that holy impartiality, 
which, one day or other, after having performed it as a duty to his 
fellow-citizen, he may be happy to find extended to himself. 

Time is not afforded to the advocates of general Moreau, to 
retrace, in this justificatory memoir, all the circumstances of his 
publick life. They are known to all France, and to Europe. 
They must content themselves with merely recalling to view such 
particulars as may affect the accusation of which he is the object. 

Arrived, by regular advances, to the rank of General of Brigade, 
Bf oreau served in that capacity in the army of the north. He had 
under him a division of twenty-five thousand men, when, in' the 
second year, Pichegru took the chief command. This was the first 
of their personal intercourse. He was not, therefore, as has been 
asserted in several pamphlets, a pupil of that general. But it is true 
that he had conceived for the talents of Pichegru, then one of the 
best generals in Europe, as much respect, as, in his subsequent 
relations with him, he entertained attachment for his person*^ 
Their connexion, however, was not of long continuance. Piche- 
gru had only commanded eight months, when, in the third year, 
he passed to the army of the Rhine, and Moreau succeeded hini 
in that of the north. 

Peace with Prussia gave him a few months repose in Holland, 
In the fourth year, Pichegru was recalled by the Directory ; and 
Moreau, became general, of the army of the Rhine. He took the 
command on the first of Messidor ; on the 6th he passed the Rhine* 
'No one in France can forget, that, under the conduct of its new 
general, the march of this army was from victory to victory .^ 
The world will long remember the battles of Renchen and 
Friedberg, which made Moreau master of Suabia, Bavaria,^ 
and the circles of Upper Rhine ; and the defeat of the army of the 
Sambre and Meuse, which left him one hundred leagues from the 
frontiers of France, in the centre of Germany, and surrounded by 
tv/o armies of his enemies — only to increase his glory. All Eu- 
rope looked upon him as lost; and France already deplored the 
destruction of an army so distinguished for bravery, and of an 
ofncer whom this campaign had placed amongst the greatest gene- 
rals. But it was Moreau who commanded Frenchmen. He 
accomplished that skilful retreat, which procured him more grate- 
ful rewards than fame could confer, as from it he derived the hap- 
piness of having preserved so many soldiers, heroes, Frenchmen^ 



[ 5 ] 

After having defeated in many battles, but particularly in the me- 
morable battle of Biberach, the armies which pursued him, he 
repassed the Rhine at Hunninguen and Brisach, during the first 
days of the fifth year, over the bodies of those who had vainly 
imagined that they could forever prevent his return to France 5. 
bringing with him 7,000 prisoners, several standards, and upwards 
of forty pieces of the enemy's artillery ; and bringing with him, 
what was infinitely more precious, that army, undiminished, whose 
return from Germany none had been so sanguine as even to hope 
for. 

The campaign of the year 5, was not less brilliant, It opened by 
a second passage of the Rhine, effected by the French army at 
Diersheim, ©n the first of Floreal, with equal valour and success. 
The defeat of the enemy was complete. Four thousand men and 
one general made prisoners, several standards, twenty pieces of 
cannon, the military chests, the bureau of the staff-major; and the 
fortress of Kehl, taken the next day after an obstinate fight of forty 
hours, were the fruits of this memorable passage. 

There now remained no obstacle to the complete possession of 
Germany. But, in the mean time, the conqueror of Arcole and 
of Rivoli was better employed than in gaining victories. He made 
use of the terrour which his name and his arms had inspired to pre- 
pare peace for his country. The preliminaries of Leoben were 
signed ; and the army of the Rhine and Moselle was arrested in 
its career of conquest. 

Sometime after the passage of the Rhine the cabinet of General 
Kinglin fell into the hands of the French, It contained a great 
number of papers, and, amongst others, a voluminous correspon- 
dence in characters ; which were immediately carried to Moreau. 
Desaix was then indisposed. To him was committed the task of 
decyphering this correspondence. It w^s long and enigmatical ; 
much time was, consequently, necessary to comprehend it. — From 
it, however, was learnt, by Moreau and those emploj'ed to explain 
it, that Pichegru had, in the fourth year, maintained certain im- 
proper relations with the French princes. 

It was not possible to apprehend any thing from any project that 
might have occasioned this correspondence, as it referred entirely 
to the state in which the army of the Rhine was at the time it was 
projected, and to the movements it might malce under general 
Pichegru. For upwards of a year that general no longer com- 
manded this army, nor indeed any other. It is true he had become 
a member of the council of five hundred ; but in that capacity he 
possessed no power over any of those means upon which the de- 
sign disclosed in the correspondence with Kinglin seemed to de- 
pend. Besides Moreau had so effectually suppressed every spirit 
of dissaffection j had, by his loyalty, so overborne and discon- 



[ 6 ] 

certed every plan which might have been laid ; restored such a 
spirit to the army ; and infused such a terrour into the minds of the 
Germans, by the first passage of the Rhine, the battles of Renchen 
and Friedberg, the invasion of Bavaria one hundred leagues from 
the French frontier, the miraculous retreat in presence of the two 
armies of his enemy, and the battle of Biberach which was as a 
leave taking of the Austrians in the fourth year ; that a peace must 
necessarily have ensued the second passage of the Rhine in the 
year 5, even had not the good genius of Buonaparte already com- 
manded it in Italy. 

Such was the conduct of Moreau and his army. — That army upon 
which, one year before, some pragmatical politicians had built 
delusive expectations, the folly of which, was soon sufficiently de- 
monstrated. Perhaps a general who ht»d, by such glorious acts, 
destroyed those expectations, might be permitted to despise the 
projects upon which they were founded ; to revenge, by victories, 
the suspicions which they dared to entertain of the loyalty of his 
army ; and to content himself with having done so, without, use- 
lessly as affected the state, denouncing a comrade and friend, who 
perhaps had erred, but whose errour was no longer to be feared, as 
he had been effectually deprived of all the means from v/hich any 
injury could have proceeded. 

Moreau then did not at first write to the Directory concerning 
Fichegru. And will eA'^en acknowledge that he never would have 
done so, had circumstances left him master of his own conduct. 
But towards the end of the fifth year, the secret of the correspon- 
dence vv^ith Kinglin began to be spoken of. 

At the time when it was decyphered, it passed through several 
hands. General Moreau knew that it was publickly discussed. 
Two of his officers told him that he must resolve, either to give an 
account of it to the Directory, or be comprized in the denunciation 
which others were determined to present against both Pichegru 
and him, if he any longer persisted in his silence. 

Urged by necessity, he determined, on the I'Ah Fructidor, to 
write to the Director Barthelemy, and to reveal to him the secret 
of which the whole army was now in possession, and which must 
^n a few days be known to every one. He asked the advice of this 
director how he should act ; nor did he dissimulate the repugnance 
inspired by the part he was compelled to perform : " You know me 
sufficiently, said he to M. Barthelemy, to believe that this confi- 
dence costs me very dear." 

The act of accusation dates this letter the 19th Fructidor. An 
imperfect formation of the figure may have occasioned this errour. 
The truth is that it is dated the seventeenth ; but at any rate very 
little importance can be attached to the date. 

The act of accusation further says, that he did not write to Ear- 



[ 7 ] 

thelemy until he was informed, by the telegraphe, on the morn- 
ing of the 18th, of the steps taken by the Directory. 

This also is incorrect. But it is not the only errour which that in- 
strument exhibits. When an accusation is made against any one, it is 
the duty of the accuser, with religious accuracy to ascertain, in the 
first place, the truth of the charges. The truth in this instance is, 
that, in the fifth year, there had not been a telegraphe established 
on the Strasburg line. It was first erected in Brumaire, year 6. 
And a further proof that Moreau knew nothing of the events of the 
18th Fructidor, at the time he wrote, is, that he wrote to Barthe- 
lemj^, one of the proscribed. 

The letter was delivered to the Executive Directory. It plain- 
ly saw that this tardy disclosure was not spontaneous on the part 
of Moreau ; his commission was immediately revoked, and he 
returned to his private station. 

Such is the history of this denunciation, which has been so much 
insisted on, as constituting a justifiable source of inextinguishable 
hatred between Moreau and Pichegru. On the contrary, the 
smallest spark of justice on the part of the latter, must have con- 
vinced him of what he owed to the friendship that had so long de- 
layed a measure which was at last adopted only in compliance v/ith 
an irresistible necessity. 

Pichegru was sentenced to deportation. Escaped from, the hor- 
rours of Cayenne, he returned to Europe. Moreau maintained 
no relation with him, nor even heard him spoken of, until the 
year 10. 

The conduct of Moreau in this interval has been in open sight 
of all France. We have seen hira, in the year 7, at the instance 
of the Directory, which had recovered frona the erroneous impres- 
sions of the year 5, accept a subaltern rank in the army of Italy. 
We have seen that man, who is this day accused of ambition, 
serve under Scherer v/ithout even venturing the slightest objection. 
— We have seen him, after the misfortunes of that general, assume, 
for a moment, the command of the army ; preserve it from total 
ruin ; collect its scattered fragments ; make head with twenty-five 
thousand against one hundred thousand men ; retire, step by step, 
and without check, by the Milanese and Piedmont ; throw garri- 
sons into all the strong places ; engage the Russians near Valentia ; 
render useless, by skilful dispositions, the immense superiority of 
his enemy ; and, in fine, concentrate his forces in the Genoese 
territory, there to wait the arrival of general Macdonald. We 
have seen him a short time after, united v/ith that general, by a 
victory over Bellegarde, inaugurate the plains of Marengo in those 
prodigies of valour and genius, with which another hero soon after 
astonished them and the woild. We have seen him, after having 
performed so many wonders, in the month of Thermidor, year 7, 



, [ 8 ] • 

resign, without a murmur, the command of an army he had saved 
to general Joulaert, who, affected even to tears, by the order esta- 
blished by Moreau, and by the noble simplicity with which this 
unassuming soldier relinquished the chief rank, could not refrain 
from giving him the most publick marks of veneration and grati- 
tude. We have seen him at the request of his successor, without 
any command, but, as he himself used in a laughing manner to 
say, as an amateur, assist at the too celebrated and too unfortu- 
nate battle of Novi, v/here the brave but ill-fated Joubert was kil- 
led in the first charge. There we have seen him fighting in the 
ranks as a private soldier, while three horses were killed under 
him ; retarding by the effects of his valour a defeat which he had 
feretold ; in the moment of rout and disaster accepting the perilous 
honour of commanding a beaten army, assigned to him by the uni- 
versal acclamation of generals, officers, and soldiers ; restoring it 
to order, and presenting it with such a terrible aspect to its enem.ies 
that they durst not venture to pursue, as he re-conducted it in safe- 
ty to its strong positions in the territory of Genoa ; thus holding 
the key of Italy, and preparing victory for the general who was to 
succ;eed him. And v/e have seen him, finally, deliver this army, 
at the order of the Directory, to General Championnet. Thus have 
we beheld him, with the docility of an infant, assume and lay 
down, reassume and again resign, as necessity, or the caprice of 
those whom he always acknowledged as his magistrates, might 
dictate, the command of an army wholly devoted to him ; and 
which he might easily have retained, by the double power derived 
from his talents and the filial love of a grateful soldiery, v;^ho ac- 
knowledged him as their saviour and their father. 

Such was Moreau until the month of Vendimiaire, year 8. That 
same Moreau, whom this act of accusation compels to vindicate 
himself against a charge of conspiracy. Let us see how he has be- 
trayed the interests of his country. 

Early in the eighth year he returned to Paris. There he found 
one of the directors despairing of the government on account of its 
weakness ; a weakness so dependent on the vices of its nature, as 
to bafHe the most distinguished talents of any executive. This di- 
rector seemed convinced that every thing in France was lost, if a 
more energetick government were not devised j whose admiaistra- 
tion being less divided, should be better calculated for the aflfairs 
of a great and extensive empire. 

He expressed his sentiments to Moreau, and Moreau was con- 
vinced of their justice. But where v/as the man who at such a 
Juncture could grasp, with a hand sufficiently firm, the helm of af- 
fairs, and recover for France that ascendancy over Europe which 
she had lately possessed ? The visionary policy of the Directory 
had deprived France of her surest support, then, in a manner, ba- 



[9 ] 

nished to Egypt, whence it was scarcely possible the fleets of Eng- 
land would permit him to return. Moreau had only to speak one 
word, and his was the supreme power. He is not afraid to confess, 
that, had he believed himself capable of securing the pubiick good, 
he would not have hesitated to accept it. But on examining him- 
self, he did not perceive any indication that he was the person 
designed by heaven to fix the destinies of France. 

Far from his mind, even at this moment of unmerited humilia- 
tion, be every idea of false diffidence. Moreau is not guilty, in 
this acknowledgment, of injustice towards himself. He knows, 
and he may be permitted to avow it, wherein his own worth con- 
sists : he knows what station nature designed him in the political 
order ; his place will be found in the hour of danger and in the field 
of battle, whenever and wherever the chief of the nation shall deign 
to assign it to him. Every other situation appalled his courage. 
The weight of political affairs he never could endure. That total 
renunciation of domestick endearments ; that unremitting subjec- 
tion of the mind to pubiick concerns, which is the first and rigor- 
ous duty of those on whom devolve the chief magistracy ; that 
fatiguing attention to the cares of goverament, pressing from morn- 
ing 'till night and from night 'till morning, which cannot be evaded 
by those who accept the place to which they are attached ; that 
extent of judgment which must be possessed in order to regulate 
the concerns of a great nation ; that decision of character which is 
necessary, after the storms of a long revolution, to subjugate the 
various passions of various parties ; that rare discernment which 
is requisite in order to steer clear of those quicksands that are rea- 
dy to ingulph an unskilful pilot, and to know exactly how far to in- 
dulge, or where to oppose, popular opinion, to manage the passions 
so as to render male-contents or even enemies useful ; that genius, 
in one word, which comprehends every thing, regulates every 
thing, and foresees every thing ; which conceives the whole and 
distributes the details ; which at the same time is occupied with 
external dangers, and internal regulations, with men and with 
things, with the prosperity of the governed and the safety of the 
government; the assemblage of all these qualities, so requisite but 
which we had so long despaired of finding united, Moreau, without 
blushing, acknowledged could not be found in him. Led by an ir- 
resistible propensity to the happy walks of domestick life, he 
thought that, after having paid to his country the debt, which, as 
a citizen, he owed her, he might be allowed to indulge his private 
taste ; that he might at last return to the plough-share, after having 
so long managed the sword. Such enjoyments he looked to as the 
end and consummation of his labours. Judge then how far he was 
disposed to profit by the overtures of the director. 

The constant subjects of their private discussions, however, con= 



[ 10 1 

tinued to be the necessity of such a government, and the impossi- 
bility of then finding, in France, that person in whose hands it 
could be safely deposited, when they learnt that, by a miracle as 
incomprehensible as fortunate, Buonaparte had disembarked at 
Frejus. Moreau immediately hailed the omen ; let every thing 
be postponed, he cried, until Buonaparte arrives — 'In him behold 
the destined saviour of France. 

The rest is known. Buonaparte arrives. The director disclo- 
ses the project to him. Moreau is consulted. The eighteenth 
Brumaire bursts upon us with all its splendour. Moreau dissolves 
the Directory. Buonaparte is proclaimed Consul. 

Moreau, by the appointment of the consul, took command of the 
army of the Rhine. He re-organized it ; and, on the 5th Floreal 
year 8, he crossed that river a third time at its head. On the 13th 
and 14th he defeated Kray at Engen, took from him seven thou- 
sand men, ninety pieces of cannon, and a large portion of his mili- 
tary stores. The 15th he gained the battle of Mosskirch. On 
the 19th he conquered a second sime at Biberach, on the same 
field which first felt his victorious tread three years before. He de- 
tached twenty -two thousand inen to the army of Italy, to assist, 
under the auspices of the greatest of the French generals, in decid- 
ing the fate of France and of Europe. He did not the less eager- 
ly pursue the path of victory. He passed the Danube ; subdued 
Augsburg ; expunged the stigma which French valour had for- 
merly received in the plains of Hochstet'^', by a victory which gave 
him five thousand prisoners, five stands of colours, twenty pieces 
of cannon, and immense stores. He continued his triumphant 
progress. Neuberg, Laudstrutt, bestov/ed new laurels on his 
soldiers. Munich opened her gates. The Orisons submitted. 
Croia v/as taken : and the army of the Rhine thus in a manner 
witnessed that almost supernatural victory, by which the brave ar- 
my of Italy, under that illustrious chief who has always sported 
with perils and with difficulties, re-established for ever the supre- 
macy of France, and gave peace to Europe. A truce was granted 
by this army, at the same time that Moreau, by an armistice, per- 
mitted the German empire to repose for a moment. That moment 
was soon at an end. Moreau was ordered to recommence hostili- 
ties, lie marched. The battle of Hohenlinden announced that 
his genius presided : the battle of Hohenlinden, which, next to the 
miracles of Italy, and the immortal day of Marengo, will be for- 
ever hailed as the most brilliant example of French bravery ; the 
battle of Hohenlinden, which put into the hands of Moreau, ten 
thousand prisoners, three captive generals, eighty pieces of cannon, 
and two hundred covered waggons. 

* Alluding to the victorj gained by the Duke of Marlborough, in 1704, commonly 
called the battle of Blenheim,, from a village which lies s. w. three miles. TRA^"3. 



L II ] 

The frontiers of Austria are passed. Saltzburg receives a gar? 
rison. Vienna trembles at the vicinity of a republican army. An 
armistice is solicited. The conquerour dictates the terras. Peace 
is signed. And the destinies of France are finally determined. 

Moreau was once more restored to his family. The enemies of 
the publick happiness, whatever may have been their design, la- 
boured to give the chief magistrate the most false impressions of a 
man who most sincerely desired his prosperity. Their good un- 
derstanding was interrupted. Moreau made some strong efforts 
to restore it. These failing, he retired to domestick obscurity. 
He broke off all these connexions which had a tendency to disturb 
the tranquillity of the life he had adopted ; maintained no further 
relation with men in power ; and even avoided the society of many 
of his old companions in arms. He in some manner became 
estranged to all former habits and affections ; certainly not because 
he was insensible of their charm, but because he did not wish to 
furnish any weapon for calumny. A few friends, mostly men out 
of place and of retired dispositions, formed his circle. The 
amusements of a rural life, the chase, and social intercourse with 
his own family, occupied all his time. While devoted to them, he 
patiently awaited the arrival of a period when the present clouds 
should disappear ; when some happy occasion should enable him 
to convince the first consul, by his services should they be requir- 
ed, or by his devotedness were it necessary to give a new proof of 
it, that he never had ceased to honour his talents, and rejoice in 
his glory and success. 

This tranquil life was all at once disturbed, by an incident which 
awakened remembrances almost effaced from the mind. 

General Moreau had formerly been intimately acquainted with a 
curate of Pompadour, a man of talents, and uncle of general Sou* 
ham, named David. This David in 1793, during the persecution 
of the priests, took refuge in the staff-major of his nephew. Gene^^ 
ral Moreau was then in the service of the Republick. But let us 
here bear testimony to a trait in his character which none can 
contradict. He always abhorred those persecutions, with whicl^ 
many self-stiled republicans aflllicted the various classes of citizens : 
whoever was a Frenchman and a man of honour, possessed unfailing 
claims upon his protection, wherever it could be afforded. M. Da- 
vid was unhappy ; he was therefore welcome to the general. Da- 
vid, his nephew general Souham, and Moreau, lived together in 
the house of Pichegru : and afterwards, when those different per*. 
sons met each other, it was with that pleasure which is always fel$ 
in the presence of those whom we have known in times of adversity. 

Moreau had heard no more of David from the time of Pi_hegru's 
deportation, until the middle of the year 10, when he one day den 
manded an interview with the general. Its object was to oDtain 

C 



[ 12] 

an explanation of what he called the denunciation of Pichegru, 
Moreau satisfied him ; satisfied him so entirely, that he became 
the mediator of a reconciliation between the two generals. A re- 
conciliation which ought not to occasion any surprise, after the 
detail which we have given of the facts that produced the innocent 
letter of the 17th Fructidor. 

Whatever may have been the nature of this reconciliation, the 
details of which constitute three charges in the act of accusation, 
amongst .which figures the crhne of being reconciled, it was with 
the greatest surprise that Moreau learnt, about the beginning of 
Pluviose last, from Lajolais, (a friend of Pichegru, whom he had 
som.e occasion to know the preceding summer) that Pichegru was 
then in Paris. Lajolais even virged an interview at different places 
which he named, where Pichegru wished to discuss his own parti- 
cular, affairs. But Moreau thinking his return to Paris, without 
the sanction of government, extremely imprudent, constantly re- 
fused to meet him. 

Pichegru, having resolved, a.t all risks, to see Moreau, came to 
his house about eight o'clock on the evening of the 11th Pluviose. 
It was a day most unhappily chosen by a man whose greatest desire 
must have been concealment, being the particular day of each 
week set apart, by the general, for receiving the visits of his 
friends. 

Moreau, after a few moments of unimportant conversation, 
pressed him to be gone. 

Some days afterwards he repeated his visit, equally unexpected^ 
This was his last. Here terminated all personal communication 
between them ; and Pichegru was no more heard of by Moreau ; 
except it was, as is stated in the act of accusation, the next day by 
a certain Roland. 

' These visits, and the words supposed to have been then said, 
by Moreau to Pichegru, and by Pichegru to Moreau, of which, by 
the bye, no one was a witness, are the groundwork and the sub- 
jects of an accusation against an illustrious and hitherto untainted 
general. 

Pichegru, say they, long ago meditated the restoration of the 
Bourbons. He plotted in their favour in the year 4 : and hence 
Moreau, either by the intrigues of Pichegru, or by his tardiness 
in denouncing him, has become an object of just suspicions. 

Since that period, they continue to urge, by the intervention of 
David and Lajolais, Moreau has been fully reconciled with Piche- 
gru, and has even held communication with him ; circumstances 
which, from the antecedent conduct of Moreau, were totally in- 
compatible with the laws of honour ; they are therefore criminal, 
and could have no other view than to disturb the publick repose. " 



[ 13 ] 

In fact reports have circulated in London, that Moreau had pro- 
mised to re-establish the princes of the house of Bourbon. 

. That, in consequence of this promise, Pichegru and other Roy- 
alists had come to Paris ; had had interviews with Moreau, which, 
could not be otherwise than illicit and criminal ; that to him were 
made, on the part of the Bourbons, certain overtures, which he 
rejected it is true, but only by substituting others of his own pro- 
jecting, to wit, that he would place himself at the head of the 
Royal party, as soon as the first consul should be assassinated, on 
condition that they declared him dictator ; with full power to act 
according as his own inclination should impel him. 

In short, Moreau must, at all events, be guilty, although he 
did refuse to take any part in the conspiracy of Pichegru, in as much 
as he did not denounce it to the government : — 

1. Of the possibility of having formerly been the accomplice of 
Pichegru. 

2. Of being reconciled to, and maintaining a culpable correspon- 
dence with, Pichegru. 

S. Of having engaged to re-establish the princes of the house of 
Bourbon on the throne of France : an engagement attested by 
the reports and hearsays circulated in London. 

4. Of having had interviews with Pichegru at Paris ; of having 
rejected certain overtures, but by substituting others, which had 
for object the overthrow of the consular government. 

5. Of not having revealed the residence of Pichegru in Paris. 
Such are the crimes alleged against General Moreau in the act 

of accusation ; and such are the several charges to which it is our 
duty to reply. 

FIRST CHARGE. 

Moreau the accomplice of Pichegru, in the year 5. 

This is a charge which ought not to have been introduced into 
the present process. Of what consequence, in the year 12, to the 
consular, and particularly to the imperial, government, is a con- 
spiracy, real or imaginary, the object of which was to annul, in 
the year 4, the fragile constitution of the year 3, which the 18th 
Brumaire so happily reduced to dust, amidst the general plaudits 
of the nation ; 

In what predicament should each of us at this moment appear, 
if the government under which we now so happily repose after a 
tempest of such long continuance, espousing all the quarrels of 
every government which has been erected and proscribed in France, 
during the last fi^fteen years, should demand from us a rigorous 
account of all that we may have done, for or against the old mo- 
narchy of IT'SS, for or against the constitutional monarchy of 1791, 



[1*] 

foi* or against the revolutionary government of the third year, for 
or against the Directories of Vendimiare, of Prairial, or of Fruc- 
tidor ; which have been in such rapid succession overturned by 
each other? 

On the 18th Brumaire France emerged from a chaos. It is 
from that day she should date her existence. All which preceded it 
is involved in midnight darkness. On that day the national will, 
to secure the publick repose, proscribed, en masse, all this tram of 
ephemeral government, and ordained that no man should be ques- 
tioned upon what had been his conduct under their influence. 

It is then a mere mockery to make the conduct of Moreau against 
the Directory, previous to the 18th Fructijdor, a subject of crimi- 
nal enquiry. If he was at that time guilty towards it, what must 
have been his subsequent degree of guilt ? Was it not he, who, on 
the 18th Brumaire, marched to the Luxembourg, and there held 
that feeble authority in awe, whilst, at St. Cloud, another govern- 
inent arose at the wish, and for the happiness, of France. 

This imaginary offence of Moreau against the Directory, in the 
year 4, should not, therefore, form any part in the present accusa- 
tion. But they will tell us that it is only inserted to bring back, fat' 
SL moment, the recollection of that want of duty which is exhibited 
by his letter of the 17th Fructidor, the motives of which were not 
inown, but which a contemplation of his glory, and his victories, 
had long since obliterated. 

Such is not according to regular process, nor consistent with the 
nature of an accusation. In rigorous construction of law, there is 
no necessity of a justification against a charge so advanced. Ne- 
vertheless general Moreau seizes, with pleasure, this occasion to 
explain himself, in the face of the whole nation, on the part he 
acted prior to the 1 8th Fructidor. 

It appears but too true that Pichegru had, in the year 4, main- 
tained a correspondence with the army of the royalists, and the Prince 
of Conde. The plan seems to have been, to cause Louis XVIII 
to be acknowledged, to make the army of the Rhine declare in 
his favour, mount the white cockade, get possession of several 
Strong places, &c. &c. 

But Pichegru and the Prince could not agree on several points ; 
J)articularly whether the right or the left bank of the Rhine should 
be the scene of action in the first instance ; and also on a general 
amnesty, and the confirmation of the sales of national property, 
which the one exacted and the other refused. 

Such is the general purport of the papers of Offenburg. What- 
ever these papers may say as to the charges against Pichegru and 
others, it is most unjust that any suspicion should, from them, 
extend to Moreau, or enter into the act of accusation against him* 
His name is not mentioned in them more than three or four times, 



[ 15 ] 

and alAV ays either to express that he is not in the confidence of Pi" 
ehegru, or in recounting events that have taken place. There is 
not in the whole, one word from which an inference can be drawn 
that he was even tampered with. The Attorney-General has not 
cited, nor can he cite, any thing from them to support the idea. 

Why then has that officer endeavoured to establish such a doubt j 
when not only are these papers devoid of any thing indicating Mo- 
reau to have been involved in the plot, but when all his conduct, at 
that epoch, contradicts even the possibility that he could ever have 
been so ? it was at the moment of its existence that he took upon 
himself the command of the army, to guide it, during a whole, 
year, from one victory to another, into the very heart of Germany, 
and to crown all his treasons, in a manner the most singular, by 
that wonderful retreat, which excited the admiration of the oldest 
generals, even amongst foreigners and enemies. 

Moreau was the accomplice of Pichcgru 1 Happy wretch ! How 
easily might he then have consummated his crime, without incur- 
ring the risk of reproach I He had only to leave the work to for- 
tune ; she alone, in the midst of Germany, in an unknown coun- 
try, surrounded by two powerful armies, would have been fully 
adequate to the destruction of the French. It v/as only nececsary 
that he should not counteract her. He had only to abstain from that 
effort of genius which no person living believed possible. His army 
must have perished, the treason would have succeeded, and the 
traitor, who had had the wonderful art to conceal his perfidy be- 
neath the blandishments of repeated and brilliant victories, would 
have been lamented, caressed, and honoured. 

Away then with this foolish charge, which gives the lie to the 
universal voice of Europe ; and against which the national gratitude 
alone ought to have been his guarantee. 

But, at least, says the act of accusation, he too long delayed to 
disclose to the difectory the plot in which Pichegru was then in- 
volved. We reply :•— 

1, The papers seized could not be understood until they had 
been decyphered, which necessarily occupied much time. No one 
was there designated by his name ; and the evidences of their ap- 
plication, when they were collated, appeared so little decisive, 
that those who seemed to be implicated by them, being put on ti-ial 
were acquitted ; and it is probable that even Pichegru would him- 
self have been discharged, if, instead of receiving immediate sen- 
tence of deportation, he had been sent to ansv/er before a tribunal. 

2. This plan was to have been put in execution in the year 4, and it 
was now near the close of the year 5, General Moreau command- 
ed the army ; he had every thing under his ccntroul ; he watched 
the suspected ; he arrested the intriguers ; tried and punished the 
spies* All was rendered abortive, broken destroyed. These pro= 



[ 16 ] 

ceedings, and the victories gained over his enemies, will speak bet- 
ter for the disposition infused by him into the army, than any de- 
nunciation of its chief for having endeavoured to corrupt it, could 
possibly do. 

3. Besides, this denunciation must have been directed against Ge- 
neral Pichegru, first the commander and afterwards the friend of 
Moreau. It could have had no other consequence than that of 
sending him a few days sooner to Guyana. But the projects con- 
certed with the prince of Conde in the year 4, and the scheme of 
overturning the government by the army, were matters very dis- 
tinct from what was passing in Paris in the year 5, fi'om all those 
trifling and miserable disputes between the councils, on which the 
Directory, imbecile as it was, had only to breathe, and they were 
annihilated. 

4. Lastly, a proof that general Moreau conducted himself pro- 
perly upon that occasion, is, that the publick opinion, not informed 
of the circumstances which drew from him the letter of the 17th 
Fructidor, censured him with one accord for having written it. — 
Let publick men contemplate the capriciousness of Moreau's situ- 
ation, then universally censured for having denounced Pichegru, 
even at that late day, now accused and brought to trial for not hav- 
ing done it with more alacrity. 

But let us at once put an end to the discussion of this odious 
charge, by an expression, equally distinguished for reason and 
dignity, which escaped from the pardonable impatience of General 
Moreau, when, at the tribunal, he recurred to this point — " If I 
eri-ed, it was an errour agamst the Directory ; which has since 
been sufficiently expiated, by having gained thirty battles, and sav- 
ed two armies." 



SECOND CHARGE. 

Reconciliation and culpable relation -vvith Pichegru, in 
England, through the agency of David and Lajolais. 

The Abbe David, the mutual friend of Pichegru and Moreau, 
conceived the design of reconciling them. 

This was the proper movement of David ; it does not appear 
that any impulse on the part of Moreau had induced him to seek 
this accommodation. 

His first sentiment was to resist it. This is attested by the pro- 
<'.eedings of the court. 

David wrote to Pichegru, mentioned the first conference, but 
concealed the repugnance of Moreau, and offered his mediation ; 
which was accepted by Pichegru. 

David again saw Moreau, and insensibly weakened his objec- 
tions. 

Each of the generals thought he had cause of displeastire against 



[ 17 ] 

the other, on circumstances relating to their military and publick 
life. 

By the intervention of David, who communicated to each the 
letters he had received from the other, they explained, were re- 
conciled, and interchanged forgiveness, but without writing to 
each other. 

Things having arrived at this point, nothing appears more natural 
than the letter Avritten by Moreau to David in Messidor, year 10, 
in which he says, that " he would not attempt to justify himself on 
the denunciation he had made ; that if any one had a right to re- 
proach him it was the government and not general Pichegru, 
whom he thought he beheld sufficiently explained in the papers 
found ; but whom he still wished to have saved from an accusa- 
tion ; he regretted that the part which Pichegru had chosen in the 
three last campaigns had confirmed this opinion. As to any thing 
further, that the situation of Pichegru gave him much pain ; that 
he would with pleasure use any means in his power to be useful to 
him ; and that if any one had authority to say that he was the cause 
of that situation, he would immediately remove such an impres- 
sion." 

We cannot but remark, that, notwithstanding the obliging style 
of this letter, notwithstanding the forgetfulness of errours, that 
General Moreau had not recovered from the opinion he had form- 
ed on the conduct of Pichegru. It was constantly, in his eyes, an 
indelible stain. 

The letter itself appeared to David so innocent that he shewed 
it, not only to the friends of Pichegru, but to persons in authority, 
and to distinguished generals, who still preserved a friendship for 
the ex-general. 

As to Moreau himself, his soul the seat of every generous sen- 
timent, incapable of an eternal resentment, could not for a moment 
think there was wrong in ceasing to retain enmity against Pichegru: 
and when that old friend solicited a reconciliation, his heart, 
stronger than any other power, forbad him to refuse it. 

Moreau could not believe himself guilty in expressing a wish to 
see Pichegru return to France ; when at the same time he beheld 
every drawing-room in Paris open to the general-officers of the ar- 
my of Conde, whom he had overthrown in battle the year before. 

General Moreau could not believe himself more guilty than other 
generals, who had promised to aid him in procuring permission 
for Pichegru to return ; one of whom especially applied to the First 
Consul in his favour. 

General Moreau could not consider the relations maintained by 
Pichegru with the enemy, in the first month of the year 4, nor his 
subsequent denunciation, as motives now existing to oppose or 
check his exertions to obtain his liberty of return to France. 



[ J8 1 

The dangers which, through Pichegru, threatened the country, 
had long ago passed over ; it was Moreau who averted them. As 
the successor of Pichegru, in the year 4, he had, by almost innu- 
merable victories, taught the imperial and royal armies, that their 
entry into the French territory was forever interdicted. He also 
taught them that they could never know him but as their con- 
querour. 

When he wrote to David the country enjoyed a perfect peace. 
His heart told him, that peace, the friend of indulgence, and the 
companion of every liberal idea, called upon him to forget the er^- 
rours of warfare. This sentiment he the more willingly indulged, 
from the recollection that a council of war, commissioned to try 
those who were charged with being accomplices of Pichegru, had 
acquited them in every instance. 

If, as asserted in the act of accusation, the two generals were 
only reconciled that they might the better concert measures against 
the government, some indication, some germ of this project, 
should be found in the preceeding or concomitant circumstances, 
or in the letters which were written to bring it about. 

Yet those circumstances do not make any such disclosure. 
And the letters do not contain, we will not say an idea, not even 
a word, which betrays on the part of Moreau the least discontent 
towards the government, or criticism upon its measures. 

But the Abbe David prepared to go England ; he was going 
there to convey to Pichegru the sentiments of Moreau ; and Pi- 
chegru remitted to him twelve louis to defray his expenses. 

From the examination in court we learn that Moreau had not 
seen David for fifteen days before his departure ; and when the 
Abbe mentioned his intended journey, contented himself with re- 
questing that his compliments might be delivered to Pichegru. 

As to money, if Pichegru did actually transmit twelve louis to 
David, so small a sum could only have been an offering to the ne- 
cessities of a friend. 

The agent of a conspiracy to which it is said England was no 
stranger, and which was intended to reverse the French govern- 
ment, could never have been at a loss for twelve louis, to enable 
him to make a journey whose object was to unite the two chiefs of 
the conspiracy. 

And general Moreau, possessing an immense fortune^^ would 
never have left his emissary at the mercy of every necessity. 

David has himself declared that the letter of Pichegru, which 
would have enabled him to draw the twelve louis, was intercepted, 
and that he borrowed, from general Donzelot, ten louis to pay the 
charges of his journey j a journey which was to determine Pichegru 
to come to Paris ; a journey which was in fact to convey the abbe to 

* Report of tiie Grand- Judge, 27 Pluviose, 12. 



[ 19 ] 

kri establishment of 250 pounds sterling a-year in England^ as tu-^ 
tor to the son of a nobleman. 

The journey of David involved so little of mystery, that he made 
it known to all the generals of his acquaintance, who were friendly 
to Pichegru, and was even charged by a member of the Senate 
with a letter for that general. 

Arrested at Calais, even aftei* he had obtained his passport^ they 
found upon him, neither letters nor instructions, which could, in 
the slightest possible degree^ bring Moreau's name into question. 

General Moreau was heard to regret the confinement of David 
in the temple. But since when has it been declared treasonable to 
lament the misfortunes of one who had been a friend ? How long is 
it since shackles have rendered sensibility a crime ? 

If David had been the agent of a plot in which Moreau was eon- 
concerned, when arrested, what ought to have been the conduct 
of Moreau ? 

Either he would have endeavoured to remove from himself every 
suspicion which the arrest might have occasioned ; he would have 
preserved himself, by flight, from the punishment attending the 
discovery of his crime ; or he would have endeavoured to aceom* 
plish his object, before the government had become wholly possess- 
ed of his views. Nothing of the kind has been attempted* 

The General took no pains to ascertain whether he was compro* 
mised by the papers found upen David* He remained unconcern- 
edly at home^ without in any thing varying his usual mode of life. 
He held no correspondence on the subject ; nor was David, that 
artisan of intrigue^ replaced by any other* 

For it must be borne in mind, that Lajolais, who is denominated 
his successor, on his own confession, and as appears by the proofs 
at the trial, had no intercourse with Mpreau for nine months after 
the imprisonment of David* 

Nevertheless the peace was not disturbed at the time when Da* 
vid was arrested. AH the usual sources of communication with 
England were open* In two weeks the plot might have been re- 
newed at Paris, approved at London, and returned to the capital 
for execution. 

When all are silent^ silence cannot be a crime. 
'And no one will, we apprehend, pretend to say that the pre- 
sence merely of Pichegru in L'ondon, and of Moreau at Paris, can 
constitute a conspiracvt 

As to the cx-general Lajolais, he did not see general Moreau 
until towards the month of PrairiaU year 11 ; when he delivered him 
an open letter of introduction from Pichegru, requesting the aid of 
the general in procuring him an employment. This letter was not 
brought from London by Lajolais ; Pichegru sent it to iiim in 
France ; a circumstance which should be carefully remembered, 

D 



[ 20 ] 

for, until the time of trial, the publick was taught to believe that 
Lajolais had made tv/o journies to England, and that it was on his 
return from the first of these journies that he delivered this letter. 

General Moreau corrected the memoir by which Lajolais solici- 
ted a place. 

They spoke of Pichegru ; and Moreau has not denied that he 
expressed to Lajolais, as he had done to the Abbe David, the sa- 
tisfaction he would derive from his free return into France. 

If this interest for Pichegru is a crime, let it find its excuse in 
the reconciliation lately effected, and in the ingenuous nature of the 
general. 

Lajolais declared, on his first examination, that, on this occa- 
sion, he saw Moreau three or four times j that he had expressed a 
wish to have an interview with Pichegru ; and said he was about 
to request it. 

The desire of this interview has been held up as a sure indication 
©f a treasonable understanding between Moreau and Pichegru ; 
the proof of which is said to be established by the visits at Paris. 

Do not the folly and improbability of putting this construction en 
the testimony of Lajolais strike at first sight ? 

We can well conceive an interview between two persons living in 
the same place, or in places adjoining. But for a person in Paris 
to ask an interview of another living in London, and to assign Pa- 
ris as the place of rendezvous, is top ridiculous. 

Yet at the trial Lajolais gave this testimony, and persisted in it 
three times. Such testimony requires to be explained. 

Lajolais is an Alsacian, and does not speak good French. He 
obsen^ed at the time, that the true force of each expression was not 
familiiar to him, and, therefore, that when he used the word /nfer-^ 
pierv^ he asked to be understood as indicating, by it, merely the 
desire manifested bjr Moreau to see Pichegru restored to France* 
Which precisely corresponds with the terms used, and the idea in- 
tended. ' 

It is quibbling to say that there is a difference between this first 
declaration^ and that of Lajolais when confronted with Moreau, 
until which time he persisted in his original replies. The differ- 
ence is not contradictory but explanatory ; for it only serves to give 
the sense in which he used the word interview. And a v/itness ne- 
ver has been hindered from explaining what he meant by his own 
evidence. To deny him that essential right would be repugnant to 
the principles of justice. 

To satisfy any One that this explanation was honest and sincere;, 
it will oiiiy be necessary to shew that the first declaration, taken li- 
terally, was so palpably improbable, that it was impossible not to 
r^adinife absurdity and falsehood. , . 

-An i»ter#iew was v/ished for by Moreau j Lajolais was to pro- 



[ 21 ] 

ceed to England to demand it from Pichegru ; and its object was 
to have been, to open, or to put in better train, a plan, of conspiracy. 

Strange 1 that Lajolais entrusted with a coniraission the executi- 
on pf which was a matter, pne would suppose, of immediate neces- 
sity, should have remained in France seven months, after having 
received it from Moreau ! 

No ; the mere circumstance of so long a time wasted in inaction 
by Lajolais, with his family in the department of the Lower-Rhine, 
is an unequivocal proof of the falseness of his first declaration, in 
the interpretation it has received. 

Another particular not less important, and which at once de* 
prives Lajolais of the title of agent for Moreau in this supposititious 
plot, is, that his examination in presence of Moreau and tlue pro- 
ceedings of the court have instructed us, that, at the very time 
when he is said to have been employed tP procure this intei'view, 
he asked general Moreau to lend him some money, which the ge* 
neral refused. 

On this fact the examinations have not throv/n the least doubt.-**** 
And will it be believed that Moreau, at the very instant when he 
entrusted his secret to Lajolais, and associated him in his plans, 
would have refused to supply him, for the moment, with a fev/ 
Louis ? 

, But as no plot can be naatured without funds, it is thejefore evi- 
dent that general Moreau, after having, initiated Lajolais into this 
conspiracy, would necessarily have placed his purse at his command, 
as he had already made him master pf his fortune and his hopes. 

And even could the plot have progressed without money, is it 
reasonable to think, that Moreau, by refusing the supply request-' 
ed, would have been so imprudent as to have run the risk of morti- 
fying the pride of a man who had the power of revealing T^is machi* 
nations. 

Poverty has ever had too great an influence over the passions, to 
allow us to depend entirely on their movements. Moreau might, 
the next moment, have become the victim of a denunciation, pro- 
voked by his own cupidity. 

To the mind of any reasoning being, wllo knows any thing of the 
human heart, the refusal to^ administer with a small sum to the 
necessities of Lajolais, is a proof suMcieilt to destroy every id.ea 
that there existed any criininal relation between him and genei'al 
Moreau. 

But to all these explanatipns which render so plain the nature of 
the momentary acquaintance of Moreau and Lajolais, let lis add 
one other, which will contribute to establish its perfect inoffensive- 
ness. 

■ Victor Couchery, to whona it appears Lajolais had said that ge? 
aeral Moreau ought-to w4-it^^ tb Ficljegrtt, waited ori the general to 



[ 22 ] 

know what dispositions had been made with Lajolais, and whether 
he did intend to write to Pichegru. 

And Victor Couchery, when confronted with Moreau, has at- 
tested that the reply of the general was, that " he had seen Lajo- 
lais two or three times on the particular concerns of the latter, and 
especially the amendments which he made to his petition for em- 
ployment ; that he had nothing to communicate to, nor could he 
correspond with, any person residing in a countr\ at war with 
France." — Couchery was then the friend of Pichegru j {general 
Moreau knew him to be so : if he had written by Lajolais, if he had 
any intention of writing, or if he had even charged him with a ver- 
bal message, what reason had he to use reserve or concealment 
with the brother of his confidant, and the most intimate friend of 
Pichegru. 

This testimony of Couchery, independent of the proof it affords 
that he had no confidential connexion with Lajolais, confirms ano- 
ther fact perhaps sufficiently established at the trial, that Moreau 
declined ail correspondence with Pichegru so long as he remained 
under the protection of the enemies of France. And that his wish 
was that the latter should remove into a neutral territory, before he 
could in any way interest himself in procuring the erasure of his 
name from the list of emigrants. 

To those who say that any intimacy between Moreau and Lajo- 
lais is liable to suspicion, on account of the denunciation of this 
officer in the year 5 ; it is easy to reply, that Lajolais was absolved 
from all crime by a judgment of the council of war ; that he had 
long since banished from his mind all animosity or resentment 
which his arrest might have occasioned ; and that he himself 
sought the interviews with the general, whose disposition was in- 
capable of repulsing him. Nay it even appeared to him, that 
«very sentiment of justice required his aid in repairing the injuries 
which Lajolais might have sustained, from a denunciation proved 
by the trial to have been without just cause. 



THIRD CHARGE. 

Moreau promisep to re-establish the Bourbons. A promise 

ATTESTED BY REPORTS CIRCULATED IN LoNDON. 

The particulars collected jn the act of accusation, and upon which 
this charge is made, are as follow. 

Russillon declared that Lajolais had asserted, in London, that 
Moreau, discontented with the government of the First-Consul, 
■fished, and would v/ith all his power aid in accomplishing, its 
overthrow. 

Bouvet said that Lajolais cQnfirmed all the hopes which, in Lon- 
don, had been built upon Moreau j that he had en|;ered into th^ 



[ 23 ] 

design of the princes ; and promised that he would present the 
prince to the armies. 

Rochelle affirmed that, in London, they calculated on Moreau ; 
without saying that Lajolais was author of the reports. 

And Roger (if we are to take the testimony of four gendarmes 
who guarded him in the temple) had heard it said that Moreau 
was one of the chiefs of the conspiracy. 

Thus reports, the author of which is not ascertained, were cir- 
culated at London, that Moreau was a chief in the conspiracy of 
royalists : these reports are attested by two witnesses only, Ro- 
chelle and Roger ; and two other persons under accusation, Russil- 
lon and Eouvet assure us that Lajolais had told the princes that 
Moreau had declared for them. 

Behold all the testimony upon which this important fact must rest. 
We will not consume our time in observing that, at the trial, 
some of these declarations were considerably varied and enfeebled. 
Bouvet in particular avowed that the royalists had been deceived 
by those who had promised Moreau to their party. He even re- 
curred several times, with great energy, to the confidence he had 
with too much facility placed upon the hearsays concerning Moreau. 
Nor is it necessary to notice that the declaration said to have 
been made by Roger at the temple, was formerly denied by him at 
the trial, in presence of two of the gendarmes who reported it; one 
of whom faltered, and the other entirely retracted. This last was 
Gilbert, who expressly said that he knew not how the name of Mo- 
reau had crept into his deposition, as Roger had never, in his pre- 
sence, spoken of him. He forcibly repeated this retraction three 
times. 

We may also be allowed to pass over the improbality that Ro- 
ger, who in all his examinations had denied every charge made 
against him, and had used all his efforts to free himself from that 
of being a conspirator, should afterwards, without any reason or 
provocation, foolishly avow, not to one only, but to a second, a 
third, and a fourth, successively, that he was so ; that he had 
heard Moreau named as one of its chiefs ; and this for the silly 
pleasure of placing a suicidial confidence in four persons utterly un- 
known to him. 

Much less need we seek to divine the extraordinary motives, 
however a knowledge of them might invalidate the testimony, 
which could induce these four gendarmes to insinuate themselves 
into the confidence of their prisoner, and to draw him into such 
conversation as might suit their purpose ; when their duty was 
merely to guard him, and be silent. 

General Moreau is under no necessity of attenuating this charge 
by any of these means. 

We will th?n content ourselves with making, in this place, one 



[ 24. ] 

observation, which. is, that the act of accusation might have exhi- 
bited many other proofs equally substantial, had it pleased Mr. 
Attorney General to have availed himself of them. We are told 
that, last summer, many journalists, in London and America, 
gave positive assurances to the publick that general Moreau had 
raised the standard of revolt against the first consul, and proclaim- 
ed the princes of Bourbon ; indeed the official Gazette of Paris has 
lately found it a-propos to republish extracts from those journals. 

In opposition to those miserable gazetteers, to those rumours 
^vithout authors, of which two of the accused, Rochelle and (as we 
are told) Roger, have spoken, to those reports made by Lajolais (if 
we credit the testimony of two other accused persons, Bouvet and 
Kussillon), let us place a fact to which each of these men has depos- 
ed, and which is even admitted by the act of accusation itself. 
The fact is this ; so far from any engagement on the part of general 
Moreau to aid the cause of the priiices, he, we will not say spurn- 
ed at a proposition to enter into their service, for such proposal 
never was made to him, but resented the bare suggestion, when 
lightly introduced into a political conversation, that with his aid 
they might recover their former authority, in the event that any 
change might, most unhappdy for France, overturn or shake the 
consular government under which we then lived. 

But these ver}^ royalists who had so industriously propagated 
those reports in England, on their arrival in Paris found bitter 
cause of complaint, when they saw how much they had been de- 
ceived : when those who had inspired them with such hopes, were 
forced to acknowledge that they were unfounded, and that Moreau, 
so far from being a royalist, would not even suffer the princes to be 
named in his presence. 

This is not the time to examine how they became acquainted 
with this truth ; nor whether those who informed them of it, did 
not wish, by mingling some thing extraordinary with their story, 
to disarm their resentment and even vengeance, for having abused 
them with such false expectations. 

- We merely adduce the fact, in this place, to shew that from Mo- 
yieau they derived no assistance j that he never declared for them 5 
never had an idea of combining with them. : 

If this be correct, and the proceedings at the trial recognize it as 
correct, we are compelled to adopt the inference, that Moreau 
never did receive any advances or propositions from the princes j 
that he never wrote, nor procured to be written, any letter to Lon- 
don, to the princes, to Pichegru, nor to any other person in their 
confidence, neither for the jjurpose of making them any promises,- 
of recalling them or their friends to France, nor of suggesting any 
means of destroj'ing the Consular government* This conclusioq 
ive^are iorced to receive, in order to avoid the most palpable ab- 



[ 25 3 

surdity. For we cannot perceive why geners*! Moreau, whoj ac- 
cording to the lamentations of the royalists, rejected or disdained 
their overtures, should chuse to amuse himself, in a manner cruel 
towards them and dangerous to himself, by sending them emissa- 
ries, inspiring them with hopes, and in fact organizing a plot, when 
all the fruit which he could reap from it, would be to involve him- 
self without the power of being extricated, and without even know- 
ing what object he proposed to attain. 

But it is insisted, in exculpation of the Attorney-General, that 
such reports were current in London. 

Such reports were current ! And at what period of the world has 
a sensible and discriminating people sentenced its generals and de- 
fenders to death on the evidence of reports spread by an enemy ? 
The resource v/ould really be admirable, if nations at war could 
free themselves from magistrates or warriours whom they dreaded, 
by indirectly demanding their heads in a gazette paragraph, or des- 
troying their reputation by an insidious report. 

Such reports were current ! We might deny this assertion : for 
what proof has been adduced to support it, farther than the justly 
suspected declarations of some co-accused persons ; who might, 
for a hundred reasons easily explained, establish fair hopes of safe- 
ty from a well timed and complaisant perjury. We might, we 
say, deny that there have been any such reports, but we choose ra- 
ther to believe in their existence. And why ? Because the Eng-' 
lish, dreading the attack with which they were menaced, doubtless 
wished to create discord in the heart of France. Some chiefs of 
the royalists thinking the circumstance favourable to their cause, 
promoted it. Partizans of the princes were, therefore, to be sent 
to France to fret the publick mind, enroll and encourage the dis-' 
contented. Great motives, strong hopes, and alluring perspectives^ 
were necessary to reanimate their audacity, humbled by fifteen 
years of reverses. Is it then extraordinary, that, in such a con- 
juncture, the name of Moreau, that name which had resounded 
through all Europe, shoiild have been prostituted ? 

Moreau had been at the head of our armies ; and was still be-i 
loved by them. But he was no longer employed by the govern^ 
ment ; and it was seen that he was even treated by it with 
coldness. Some officious propagators of hatred, vile artists of dis- 
cord, who set no value upon their country, imagined they had 
attained the object of their ridiculous ambition, when they had 
sown dissention between those great minds which ought ever to have- 
been united, were not idle in perpetuating this temporary alienation. 
The calumnies against Moreau from thence received a colour, and 
the vile detractions of his loyalty were rendered more plausible.- 
The workers of evil saw their advantage and assiduously dispersed 
these runiours. This no foresight could either anticipate or pre- 



[2S] 

vent* It is a sad truth that a man who has covered himself witli 
glory, and secured general esteem, cannot protect his name against 
the abuse of intriguers, who will commit and calumniate it at plea^ 
sure without his knowledge or consent* To render him responsi- 
ble for such abuse of himself would be equally absurd and atrocious^ 

When from those artful insinuations, disseminated as a decoy 
for subaltern characters, we ascend to their source, we find it 
cither in some anonymous pamphlet, or in the word of Lajolaisj 
who now contradicts himself. Of the four prisoners who have de- 
posed to their existence, two know not whence they are derived^ 
and two only attribute them to Lajolais* 

General Moreau^ availing himself of this disavowal of Lajolais^ 
might conclude that the two witnesses, to whom he gives the lie^ 
are in errour ; but he is compelled to declare his sentiments at 
large. All the other conduct of Lajolais justifies the presumption 
that he imposed upon Russillon and Bouvet ; and if on them doubt- 
less on many others. Upon this supposition, which is necessary 
to support the hypothesis, in the misery of Lajolais will be found 
the explanation of his conduct. 

General Moreau is too sensibly affected by the cruel necessity 
which obliges him to defend himself agaitist an ignominious accusa- 
tion, to have any desire of gratuitously adding to the weight which 
presses upon Lajolais. But Moreau knowing that Lajolais, what- 
ever may have beeni his object, has wandered from the truth on 
6ther points, can the more easily believe that he has not more 
scrupulously adhered to it on this* 

But why has he imposed upon them ? What reasons could have 
determined him, if his designs were such as are attributed to him, 
to imagine a mission which, at the bar of justice and in presence: of 
Moreau, he acknowledges he never did receive ? To make, in the 
name of general Moreau, promises not only contrary to the duty of 
the general to make, but contrary also to his well known sentiments; 
promises, to make which he formally confesses he never had any 
authority ? In his misery alone will be found the solution of the 
enigma. 

Let us for a moment enquire who this Lajolais is* 

For a considerable time attached to Pichegru^ he at first, from 
the generosity of that general, possessed the means of existence 
and the hopes of advancement. Involved in the year 5, more by 
his indiscretions than by any feal fault, in the misfortunes of his 
friend, he was subjected to two years confinement in prison^ from 
whence he was at last delivered by the judgment of a council of 
war, which acquitted him of being an accomplice of Pichegru. On 
leaving prison he found himself in the very abyss of wretchedness^ 
without employment, without money, and without the smallest par- 
ticle of property from which to obtain it. Me lived at first upod 



[ 27 ] 

tvhat he could borrow. It was known, indeed he was obliged td 
acknowledge at his trial, that he was overwhelmed with debts, 
and that he was under fears of arrest for upwards of eighty thou- 
sand francSi This was not likely to obtain him much credit. But 
he must nevertheless live : and when all other means were ex-i 
hausted, he learnt that an aecommodation had taken place between 
Moreau and Pichegru. Every purse and every door were shut 
against him. His imagination could furnish no other resource, than 
to profit by this reconciliation. He calculated that general Moreau 
would chearfully perform the first service that might be solicited 
by Pichegru. He therefore procured, we know not how, a recom- 
mendation from the latter, in which he begged that Moreau would 
endeavourtoprocuresome appointmentybr the poor general Lajolais, 
ruined by his long imprisonment. He took this letter to Gros-^Bois/ 
spoke to the general of his old friend and of their reconcilement ; 
received fromhim some common civilities; some amendments to his 
petition 5 and received also the assurance that he would have great 
pleasure in seeing Pichegru freely restored to France ; but nothing 
further. Moreau lived altogether retired ; and could not aid the 
petition of Lajolais. He candidly told him so, and counselled 
him to make application to others. 

This, and two or three other visits at Paris, opened and closed 
this acquaintance. At last, he told Moreau that he was about to 
return to Alsace, his native country, and requested to be aided 
with some money. But as no friendship for Lajolais required the 
exercise of its duties, and as he knew that it would be so much 
money lost, the general refused. This is also a fact verified at the 
trial. Lajolais departed for Alsace ; and Moreau, hearing nothing 
more of him, suffered hiiri to pass entirely from his memory; 

After he had remained, as we learn by the testimony of Cou- 
chery, for a few months in Alsace, detained there by a poverty 
which denied him the power of travelling, he at last found means 
of paying his passage to England ; whither he might go with some 
projects for augmenting his resources^ At that moment the de- 
sign of throwing back on France these inquietudes which she had 
caused in Great-Britain, fermented in every brain. An invasion 
of royalists was a desirable thing, to parry the threatened descent 
on England. The hopes of obtaining bread, might have induced 
Lajolais to avail himself of .those dispositions. It is not possi- 
ble to ascertain how far he imposed upon Pichegru, and the credu- 
lous royalists, concerning the state of France, nor how far he may 
have misused the name of Moreau j but the history of this pro- 
cess, the different circumstances disclosed by the trial, the words 
which are attributed to him by two of the accused, with much ap- 
pearance of truth, the conduct which he has observed at Paris, 
the evident falsehoods which he first advanced, then retracted, 

E 



C 28 ] 

and afterwards explained, with some considerable embarrassment? 
all these circumstances vmited, explain to Moreau that Lajolais, to 
obtain food, and to render himself of more consequence to those 
from whom he wished to extract a few guineas, had formed an in- 
genious plot* J promised them, in France, names and supports 
which they were not less dismayed than disappointed at not finding -, ■ 
and that he thus implicated in this detestable ajEfair, the name and | 
honour of general Moreau, into whose mind such ideas never had | 
entered, and from which Lajolais was at that moment removed ta 'I 
the greatest possible distance. 

This is supported by every degree of probability. If Lajolais 
originated those reports in London, reports belied (according to 
the avowal of all those who have been arrested) by the conduct of 
Moreau, is it not evident that he told falsehoods concerning Mo- 
reau; and if he did implicate Moreau by those falsehoods, he cer- 
tainly must have had a motive. — This motive could be no other 
than a scheme to procure subsistence. But because it was advan-. 
tageous to Lajolais to prostitute the name of Moreau in London, 
and to involve him in a party, is it right that general Moreau should 
be responsible for an unjustifiable conduct, by which he is already 
the greatest or only sufferer. 

A last word shall close the examination of this charge. 

General Moreau shudders with horrour at the bare idea that he 
should be even suspected of having entered into any project against 
the government ; of having einployed either Lajolais or any other 
person as a missionary to Pichegru, to the princes, or to England. 
He solemnly denies it. Not one sentence from his pen accuses, 
him. No witness, not one solitary witness has deposed to this 
pretended mission. And, thank heaven 1 neither popular rumours, 
nor the daring assertions of one man, who afterwards contradicts 
his own declarations, are, at this day, authority upon which to 
send a man to the scaffold. 

But to show, by a single trait, how much these ridiculous sto- 
ries, invented by the turbulent to deceive the weak, merit the con^ 
tempt rather than the thunders of justice, we need only remark that 
the most respectable names, even that of his imperial majesty him- 
self, have not been spared by them j and if two of the accused have 
sworn that they heard, in London, that Moreau was in the interest 
of the princes, two others have implicated Buonaparte j one of 
them, Noel Ducorps, affirms that he had been told by his brother, 
that the project to re-establish the princes, had met the sanction of 
Buonaparte^ and the other, Rochelle, says that Lajolais told him 

* The word in the original is one of the many coined by the revolutionists to express 
what in their new order of things were declared to be crimes. The phrase is, — " aourdi 
una misttfication, puisque ce mot est devcnu consacre meme en de telles matieres'' — ^The 
meaning I have givea is that iotendedj hut I k;j.Qw no translatiojx Q^mhtijlcatkn: Tram. 



[ 29 ] 

that the French armies were at the disposal of Morcau, that every 
thing was prepared for placing the Bourbons on the throne, and that 
Buonaparte himself was no stranger to this plan. 

After this, is there one man of common sense who could allow 
the fate of another to rest upon the evidence of such fables, which 
not only attack the highest names, but outrage all probability. But 
as we have already said too much on a charge so silly and incon- 
gruous, we shall now proceed to one of much greater importanceo 



FOURTH CHARGE. 

Interviews with Pichegru, and other Royalists ;— Overtures 

MADE OR received. 

Seven months had elapsed since Moreau had heard the name of 
Lajolais, when one morning, about the close of last winter, he re- 
•ceived a visit from that gentleman. In that visit he learnt from 
him, with infinite surprise, that Pichegi-u was then in Paris. La- 
jolais pressed him to consent to see Pichegru, who wished to con- 
cert the manner of procuring his publick return to France. Mo- 
reau refused : observing, that his return to France, without the 
authority of government, subjected him, if recognized, to arrest, 
and that he did not think it prudent, as that arrest might take place 
even during their interview, to expose himself to every false in- 
terpretation that might be given to such a circumstance: particu- 
larly as he had sufficiently suffered from such misrepresentation, 
in consequence of the letter of the 17th Fructidor, then and since 
so little understood. Lajolais however pressed the subject, and 
proposed several places of meeting, insisting on the strong desire 
Pichegru had to speak with him. Moreau, on his side, as obsti- 
nately persisted to refuse this indulgence. 

He thought that he should hear no more on this subject, when, 
about eight o'clock on an evening early in Pluviose last, Lajolais 
and two other persons were announced. He repaired to the hall 
and there found Lajolais, Pichegru, and Couchery. This Cou- 
chery was the friend of Lajolais, who, about eight months before, 
had waited on Moreau to know if he had any letter to send to Pi- 
chegru, and who received from Moreau the answer that he had no 
communication t6 make to that gentleman, and farther, that he 
certainly could not hold any relation with him while he remained in 
a country at war with France. 

Moreau was extremely embarrassed at this meeting ; after what 
had passed in the year 5, he never could have pardoned himself 
had Pichegru now been arrested in his house. He shewed him in- 
to a library adjoining the hall, where they remained some minutes. 
In this interview Pichegru spoke only of his desire to be erased 
from the list of emigrants, of his wish to be allowed to return to 



[ 30 ] 

France, of the means of procuring a passport, of their former com- 
rades, &c. &c. Moreau advised him, ii he wished to procure his 
amnesty to quit England, and remove for some time into Germany^ 
He then begged him to retire, assuring him that if he could be of 
any service to him he would see him with pleasure, but that not be- 
ing the case, he wished him not to repeat his visit. They were to- 
gether twelve or fifteen minutes. When they rejoined Lajolais, 
Moreau reproached him for having brought Pichegru to his house j 
and, as to himself, desired that he might never return to it. 

Certainly nothing could be less offensive than this interview.-— 
One proof that it could not be otherwise is its brevity. In a quar- 
ter of an hour it was impossible to unfold the plan of a conspiracy* 
Therefore those who speak of overtures made by Pichegru, assign 
them to a second meeting. 

Moreau did not wish again to see neither Pichegru nor Lajolais. 
He had at this first meeting expressly told them so. And in effect 
Lajolais did not return. JBut some days afterwards a Monsieur 
Roland, who, in the years 4, 5, 8, and 9, had served under Moreau 
in the army -of the Rhine, as inspector of the military transports, 
and was in the habit of occasionally paying his respects to him, 
waited on him in the morning. He asked a rendezvous for Piche- 
gru, who lodged at his house. Moreau refused it. Roland ob- 
served that he had something important to impart. Moreau per^ 
sisted in his refusal ; but to soften this denial to an old friend in 
distress, told Roland that he would, if necessary, send his secrcr 
tary to receive the communication of Pichegru. 

He patiently waited until evening for a reply, when he was told 
a person waited upon him, and on repairing to his cabinet to his 
great astonishment found M. Pichegru. Moreau was much cha- 
grined ; but as no indiscretion had escaped the general at his last 
visit, it would have been ridiculous and indecent to have shewn re- 
sentment, or to have ordered him out of the house. 

Conversation at first turned on the embarrassments of Pichegru, 
on his desire .of leave to return into France, and of obtaining a pass- 
port. But after some vague remarks, it fell upon politicks ; a 
thing not be wondered at, when the important parts that each of 
them had acted are remembered. Pichegru spoke of the intended 
descent on England, of the dangers which might arise from the 
?ibsence of the first consul, and of the changes which this event 
might occasion. It was then that he hinted something of the pro- 
gress of opinion, divested of its republican prejudices, concerning 
the Bourbons, their misfortunes, and their pretensions. Without 
developing any determinate plan, but merely as if by a supposition 
that any misfortune should ensue the invasion, and that, in conse^ 
jquence, parties should again arise to distract France, he seemed 
gpdeayouring to sound Moreau upon his dispositioiii towards tha^ 



[ 31 ] 

family. — -At that moment, and for the first time, not the disclosure 
of a conspiracy, but some shght insinuations, or as they are called 
overtures, concerning what might interest France in the event of a 
failure of the intended invasion, were made to Moreau. He drily, 
formally, and Avith minute exactness, repulsed every idea that their 
return was possible, oi that such an order of things as these re- 
marks seemed to have in view could ever exist, being totally in* 
compatible with the national temper. Nothing in the whole pro- 
cess is better attested than this conversation ; which terminated 
here, with renewed and urgent entreaties, on the part of Moreau, 
tibat Pichegru might not return. He promised, and departed. 

Their parting was cold, and Pichegru seemed much discontent- 
ed. No one was present at this conversation ; but the dissatisfac- 
tion exhibited by Pichegru on his retiring from it, is mathemati- 
cally proven. Roland, whose good will for that general cannot be 
doubted, tells us that on his return he said, Moreau is not of my 
tvay of thinking, Lajolais and Couchery depose that he seemed 
much chagrined. The intentions which were attributed to Moreau, 
and the reports circulated of his sentiments, will easily account for 
the mortification occasioned by the disappointment of Pichegru. 

However this may be, after these insinuations and the unfavour- 
able reception given them by Moreau, he saw no more of Pichegru. 
It will be recollected that he also shut his door on Lajolais. All 
the ties between him and Pichegru were in a manner broken. Ro- 
land alone had not yet been forbidden to see him. He came again 
to his house the next day. He brought back the conversation to, 
some of the ideas that fell from Pichegru the day before. A politi- 
cal discussion between men who had known each other almost eight 
years, was nothing uncommon. Roland took up the text of Pi- 
chegru. He spoke of the possible evils that might attend the inva- 
sion ; of the commotions that might result from it ; of the preten- 
sions of the Bourbons, who might profit by those commotions ; 
and plunged into a labyrinth of possibilities, fronpi which he could 
not extricate himself, and each of which, he avows, were treated 
by Moreau as mere marks of folly. 

Passing from these primary ideas to others, he questioned Mo- 
reau if he had never resolved, in case of new troubles, to possess 
himself of any authority. The notion of such a thing appeared to 
Moreau so ridiculous, that he replied to it with a smile of con- 
tempt — -" That if any new commotions should take place, there 
was a senate to controul them. He Jioped he was not mad ; and 
observed, that before a mere individual, like himself, retired 
from the world, isolated from all affairs civil or military, could be 
animated by any ambitious project, he must either be abandoned 
by his reason, or the whole machine of state must be deranged, the 
^consul, his family, and all those who then possessed authority, 



[ 32] 

must be no more — That the time for him to have coveted power, 
had he ever been ambitious, was when he was at the head of victo- 
rious armies/' — Roland receiving this check soon after withdrew. 

The General affirms this to be the true and minute history of all 
his relations and conversations with Pichegru and Roland. No 
one assisted at their interviews, nor was a witness of what passed. 
No writing by the hand of Moreau exists on the subject. Piche- 
gru is no more ; but no word uttered by him contradicts what is 
here stated. It appears therefore, not only contravening the pre- 
sumption of law in favour of innocence, but also a contradiction of 
the first principles of common reason, to imagine other facts or 
other discources than v/hat are here stated. 

Why then has the act of accusation called these conversations 
criminal, and what has been produced in conti'adiction of general 
Moreau ? 

According to the act of accusation, there had been another in- 
terview on the Boulevard-de-la-Madeleine, between him and Pi- 
chegru, at nine o'clock in the evening. Lajolais deposes to this 
interview in one of his examinations ; and Couchery says he knew 
of it, but at the trial confessed that his knowledge was from Lajo- 
lais. Eouvet-de-LoEier, in a most extraordinary declaration, 
signed by him some moments after having been saved from suicide, 
says that he repaired to the Boulevard-de-la-Madeleine, on the 
day mentioned, with Pichegru, Lajolais, and others ; that Lajo- 
lais came to Pichegru in a voiture to conduct him to Moreau ; and 
that there had been a conference between them in the Champs- 
Elysees, from which they had every reason to believe that Moreau 
was opposed to the royalists. 

According to the act of accusation, Armand Polignac knew, by 
hearsay, that there had been a conference between Moreau, Pi- 
chegru, and Georges, at Chaillot. 

According to the act of accusation, Picot declared that one day 
Pichegru expected some person in the Champs-Elysees, who did 
not meet him- The Attorney-General, in admitting that Moreau 
did not meet him, indicates that he expected Moreau ; and that he 
would not have expected him, had he not received his promise to 
he there. 

According to the act of accusation, on the word of Lajolais, it 
is stated that Moreau appointed the first meeting with Pichegru at 
his house. 

According to the act of accusation, on the word of Roland, Mo- 
reau also appointed the second meeting with Pichegru, at his own 
house, and even sent Fesnieres to conduct him. 

And according to the act of accusation, Moreau, on the word of 
Roland, at their last conference, after having in form rejected 
*yery proposition to unite in the views of the royalists, proposed 



[ 33 ] 

that thejr should adopt an entirely different plan ; that they should 
remove out of the way both the First Consul and the Governour of 
Paris, and that he, Moreau, would avail himself of a party in the 
Senate sufficiently strong, to obtain the supreme authority ; and 
that he should then be left to act in the cause according to the dic- 
tates of his own mind. 

He must reply to all these charges in the order in which they 
stand; the necessity of justifying himself is distressing ; but the 
task is not difficult. 

General Moreau has acknowledged that he saw Pichegru at his 
house. But whether he did or did not consent to meet him on the 
Boulevard-de-la-Madeleine ; whether he did or did not promise to 
meet him at Chaillot, to which place it appears he did not go ; whe- 
ther he did or did not assign a rendezvous in the Champs-Elysees, 
which he did not keep : whether the first visit at his own house 
was by appointment at the instance of Lajolais, or altogether un- 
expected by him ; whether he had granted or refused to grant the 
request of Roland for a second meeting ; whether he sent his secre- 
tary to conduct Pichegru to his house, or to learn his wishes and 
forbid his coming ; appear, at this moment, matters of the most 
perfect indifference one way or the other. 

There could certainly be no crime in promising to meet Pichegru 
at Chaillot or the Champs-Elysees when no performance followed. 
There could be no crime in seeing Pichegru once on the Boulevard- 
de-la-Madeleine, whom he has acknowledged to have twice seen 
at his own house. There could be no crime in yielding to see him 
at the request of Lajolais or Roland. Nor could there be a crime in 
sending his secretary to conduct Pichegru, or to enquire his business. 

Further, if Moreau, instead of wishing the truth only to appear, 
had consulted his own interests, far from divesting the testimony 
of these spurious allegations, he would have assiduously collected 
them : for had they all remained in the process, as they were given 
by their authors, without contradiction, who does not perceive that 
they would have been eminently justificatory ? 

Then we should have been obliged to believe Lajolais, who says 
that when, on Tuesday, he solicited a meeting in the Bouvelai^d- 
de-la-Madeleine, Moreau postponed it until Friday, on account of 
a hunting party which he expected would take place in the interim. 
Is this probable ? Moreau sends a messenger to Pichegru, in Eng- 
land, inviting him to Paris to co-operate in forming a conspiracy. 
Pichegru, obedient to the call, arrives, burning with desire to 
meet his accomplice ; and it is but reasonable to suppose an equal 
anxiety on the part of Moreau to unbosom himself to Pichegru. 
Lajolais, who had been the envoy to England, urges that meeting 
to effect which he had been at so much trouble ; and Moreau puts 
it off from Tuesday until Friday 1 he post-pones it four days because 



tu] 



there migHt be a hunt ! a hunt which however did not take place i 
Truly a most worthy cause for deferring an affair of such import- 
ance ! And the general has shewn himself a most coiniical kind 6f 
a conspirator, who leaves his cotnplotters in a suspense of fout 
days, and for what ? for a hunt ? Not so : because, forsooth, he 
expected to be one of a hunting party ! ! ! And can any one be so 
weak as to suppose that such a circumstance could have power to 
interrupt a plan of conspiracy i 

Then we should be obliged to believe the hearsays cbllected by 
Bouvet, who tells us he heard that, in this conference, Moreau 
gave reason to apprehend the formal refiisal to intermeddle in the 
affairs of the royalists, which, according to hirti, was afterwards 
given ; and by Victor Couchery who says, that on the appearance 
oi an unknown person, which by report must have been Georges, 
Moreau retired, and that the interview with Pichegru was suc- 
cinct and cold. If the appearance of Georges put Moreau to flight, 
Moreau, then, could not have been a conspirer with Georges 1 If 
the int irview with Pichegru was cold and brief, Moreau did not at 
that time distinguish himself by an alacrity and ardour in the cause 
of the proscribed ! And if from this concise conversation the roy- 
alists could foresee that Moreau would not unite with them, as the 
reports in London had taught them to hope, then it is evident that 
Moreau was not one of their party, and that he had not authorized 
those reports ! 

And we must also believe that if Moreau did promise to go to 
Chaillot and to the Champs-Elysees, he was not there, for this is 
accorded by the act of accusation. But at the same time we must 
admit, that, so far from recalling Pichegru from England, so far 
from entering into a conspiracy with him, so far from having any 
interest in common with him, he evidently demonstrated, by all 
these appointments made and disregarded, by these pretexts of 
hunting parties, by this coldness at their conferences, the strongest 
repugnance to any relation with Pichegru; and if unwilling to con- 
fer with him, consequently that he had no share in any of his pro- 
jects, whatever those might be. 

If, therefore, the general denies all these assertions, it is not be- 
cause the interest of hi s defence requires him to do so, for that interest, 
we have seen, would be better promoted by suffering them to be 
believed, but it is from his love of truth ; it is because it does not 
depend on him that things are not as represented 'f it is because he 
cannot, by his silence, be thought to admit that he had promised 
to go to the Boulevard-de-la-Madeieine, to Chaillot, nor to the 
Champs-Elysees, when he had made no such promises ; it is be-, 
cause he cannot assent to the assertion that the visits of Pichegru 
were by appointment, when they were not merely unexpected but 
forbidden. 



, . [ 35 ] 

He denies having been, as alleged, at the Boulevard-de-la-Ma" 
deleine^ and no one has deposed to having seen him there. Geor- 
ges did not see him. Bouvet did not see him. Villeneuve did not 
See himi Couchery and Bouvet spoke of this interview on report, 
and concluded that it came from Lajolais. In his written exami- 
nation Lajolais seemed to say that Moreau had been there. On 
the trial he complained that they had incorrectly stated his replies? 
he prevaricated, excused, and explained. It is evident that he 
did what he could to withdraw his first declarations. He said he 
thought he had seen Moreau, but that he could not be positive : 
that he could not be quite certain^ that he had appointed such a 
mee;ting ; nor could he decidedly assert that Pichegru and Moreau 
were there: at the same time. We shall soon see why Lajolais first 
reported this rendezvous, and afterwards testified to it on his ex- 
amination. 

He denies having been at Chaillot. The posters of the house 
where Pichegru lodged in this fauxbourg, have declared that they 
never saw him there. Of this fact there is not the least proof. 

He denies having been at the Champs-Elysees ; he denies hav- 
ing promised to be there j and no one, neither witness nor accused, 
has attested such promise. It was reserved for the act of accusa- 
tion to say that soniebody was expected there ; and as somebody 
was expected ; it could be none other than Moreau ; and that as 
^e was expected he must have promised. Can any one look for a 
•efutation of such reasoning ! In civil matters it would be despised; 
o attempt to introduce it where the life is involved is in the ex- 
reme unjust and cruel. 

Yet these meetings have existed in report, and Lajolais, who 
"ppears to be their author, has said that that at la Madeleine took 
place. How shall we explain those assertions of Lajolais, con- 
cerning these different assignations at la Madeleine, Chaillot, 
and the Champs-Elysees ; for we must attribute them to him ? 
They explain themselves very siiiiply. 

We have already been forced to adopt a conjecture, which, how- 
ever painful, we must recall to mind. Lajolais appears to have 
given hopes to the royalists respecting Moreau j and his apparent 
usefulness in the progress of their designs may have procured him 
a few guineas. This might succeed very well while they reihain- 
ed in England* 

But they came to France. Lajolais either followed or met them 
here. Here he doubtless was forcibly urged to effect a conference 
between Moreau and the rdyalists, and to procure a confirmation 
of his pretended engagements* His embarrassment may be well 
imagined^ when required to bring to issue a mission he had never 
received, to confirm promises that had never been made. But 
it would not have suited his purposes to have made a bland con£e6« 



[36] 

"^1611 that he had deceived the royalists merely to procure "money, 
but without any design of being their colleague. He set to work i 
anew. He contrived to approach Moreau, and endeavoured ta 
draw him into some in^prudent measures. Not being able to effect 
his purpose this way, he appears to have invented a promised ren^ 
dezvous ; but to calm the impatience of Pichegru he told him, as 
the proceedings attest, that it was postponed on account of a hunt- 
ing party. He then promised a meeting on the Boulevard-de-la- 
Madeleine, where he says Moreau was ; none other however saw 
him ; and to one he tells that the appearance of Georges made Mo- 
reau withdraw, to others that he spoke but one word which clearly 
evinced his apathy. His next promised meeting was in the Champs 
Elysees ; thither they repaired but met no one. He then took the 
only part left him, and conducted Pichegru to the house of Mo- 
reau, declaring it to have been by appointment of the latter. 

Thus we see how Lajolais has been drawn, perhaps in spite cf 
himself, and without any real design of injuring general Moreaij; 
into these falsehoods, merely to avoid dangerously committing 
himself with those to whom^ in London^ he had sold his fables for 
a subsistence. Here also we see the explanation of his conduct 
at the trial, where^ in the presence of that illustrious man who has 
been brought into jeopardy by his inventions, conscience asserted 
her terrible influence over him* He was evidently divided between 
personal interest and pride, which forbad him to acknowledge him- 
self an impostor ; and personal honour and probity, which com- 
manded him not to bear false witness against general Moreau ; and 
compelled him to re-examine his former declarations, to affirm that 
they had not been correctly stated, or to avow that, not being a 
Frenchman^ he was not aware of the full latitude of his own ex- 
pressions ; to explain away those which might imply guilt j to con- 
fess that he might have been mistaken, that Moreau had not pro- 
mised a rendezvous at the Boulevard-de-la-Madeleine, that he was 
not there, and that, in one word, he had never been employed by 
Moreau as an emissary to London, nor as a mean of communication 
with the royalists. This tardy sacrifice to truths if not sufficient 
to repair all the injury done to Moreau by Lajolais, yet entitles 
the latter to some degree of indulgence. 

We continue to state the denials of General Moreau. 
He denies having assented to receive the first visit of Pichegru 
at his house 5 and, independent of the tergiversations of Lajolais, 
probability alone will satisfy any one that it was not with his con- 
sent. Lajolais even from his first interrogation has declared that 
this visit was at a time when general Moreau was surrounded by 
his friends. According to the custom for some late years prevalent 
in the principal houses in the capital, the general had appointed 
one day in each week to entertain a kind of periodical society.^ 



[ 37 ] 

On this day PIchegru made his first visit. Surely had Moreau'. 
appointed the time for a meeting, we will not say with Pichegru 
the conspirator, but with Pichegru the proscribed, to whose safety 
every degree of precaution was necessary, he never would have 
named this day in particular, and designated the very hour, when^ 
by the laws of fashion, his doors must have been crowded by the 
influx of company, It is at least a consolation for general Mo- 
reau, that, almost in every instance, the act of accusationj as it 
concerns him, is at open war with common sense. 

It is this common sense that again gives the contradiction to Ro- 
land, when he assures us that Moreau had assented to the second 
interview with Pichegru, and had sent his secretary to conduct 
him. Moreau on the contrary asserts that he refused to grant this 
interview, and that to free himself from the solicitations of Ro- 
land, he sent his secretary to enquire what was the will of Piche- 
gru in requesting it. Which of these opposite assertions will be- 
credited? — That which does not ofi'end iagainst probability ; that 
of Moreau. 

What was the business of Roland with Moreau ? to ask a ren-. 
dezvous for Pichegru ? it is granted. Is any. thing more simple 
than the conclusion that follows. Roland asks Moreau to permit 
fche visit of Pichegru ; Moreau assents ; Roland goes away con- 
tented ; Pichegru comes at the appointed time, either alone, for 
he already knew the way, or with Roland from whom he had na' 
concealment. Where then the necessity of employing M. Fes-' 
nieres ? Why should he bear to Pichegru a message which would 
have been more safely entrusted to Roland ? It was necessary that 
Pichegru should be known to as few persons as possible. If then 
the intermediacy of a fourth person Avas resorted to, it must have 
been because it was rendered indispensable by some purpose ior 
which Roland was unfit ; it was because general Moreau not wish- 
ing the visit of Pichegru, who, according to Roland, had some- 
thing serious to communicate, and desiring to be at once rid of all 
importunity, sent his secretary to receive his communicatiouo 
Every conclusion of reason and logick on this point, is in favour of 
the assertion of Moreau, and against Roland. It is then Roland 
who is untrue. . -. . i 

He is untrue on a point still more important. We must now 
speak of that monstrous charge of which he is the author, and the 
bare allusion to which makes the soul recoil with horrour. 

We must remember that, according to the declaration of all the 
accused, not excepting either Lajolais or Roland, the royalists in 
calculating on Moreau found themselves deceived. Of this they 
were convmced from the very first attempts to discover his senti* 
ments. From his reception of the insinuations of Pichegru, they 
had rejected every idea that, should we unhappily lose our pilot 



[ 38 ] 

and the storm again return, they could derive any aid ffoiA hini^ 
We are informed that Pichegru, perceiving this invincible resolu- 
tion in his political conversation with Moreau, and not being able 
to account for it on any other principle than that of personal ambi- 
tion, exclaimed in a moment of extreme discontent — I see that that 
b . . . , . has sufficient ambition. Roland bore a confirmation of this 
sentiment from his conference the next day. 

Let us here pause for a moment. 

Since, as it appears, Moreau neither wished the success of the 
Bourbons nor of the royalists, it is thence evident — -That he could 
not have been their accomplice :— That he made no proposals to 
them in London ; — That he never promised them his support : — ^ 
That he did not invite them to enter France :-r-That his plotting 
*with Pichegru is imaginary: — -That the mission pf Lajolais must 
be a fable r^-r-That his concerting with Georges must be a calumny: 
——That, in a word, whatever may be the offences of Moreau to- 
wards the government, there is a real, palpable, and monstrous ab- 
surdity, in bringing him to judgment as a conspirator with the 
royalists. 

But whence the necessity of a train of reasoning to prove that a 
man did not plot the ruin of his own fame ? If the name of Moreau 
is celebrated in Europe, it has become so by the disasters of the 
house of Bourbon : by victories acquired over its allies and pro* 
tectors : by its present disgrace, which makes it every way impro- 
bable, that it should ever again be restored to power ! Yet do not 
those tremble at the baseness of the charge, who suppose that Mo- 
reau wished its return to France ! What honour, what recom- 
pense, could he thence derive ? Then indeed might he expect to 
be reproached and arraigned as a traitor. Then would he himself 
be obliged to bury all his trophies, and never again to recall any of 
his glorious military achievements; which, from the moment of 
its re-establishment, would be declared rebellion, and must mark 
him out as the most distinguished of rebels ! 

Yet of what else is general Moreau accused ? He casts his eyes 
around him, .on those crowded and fatal benches ; whont does he 
there perceive ? Far be it from his intention to insult their misfor- 
tunes ; through the struggles in which we have been involved, the 
lot of preserving a pure character has fallen to very few ; yet he 
cannot refrain from observing, that there he does not perceive 
one republican, one soldier, with whom he everheld-a communi? 
on of conduct or sentiment. He beholds only determined royal- 
ists, who have, with a fanatick and unbroken faith, continued their 
attachment to their party. He looks for his accomplices and meet.s 
only adversaries and enemies. He is the only republican who 
there occupies a seat ; nor dare one of those on either side claim 
him tis their associate, AH that any of them has ventured to say^ 



[• 89 ] 

is that he wished them to enter into his personal resentmerits ^ £lnd 
to abandon their own cause to promote his. 

And who even thus far accuses him ? Roland ! Where are the 
proofs to support the charge ? — In the word of Roland !— How is 
Moreau known to be a conspirator? — By a conversation ! — What 
accomplices, what partizans did he name ? — None ! — Have none 
of those with whom he plotted been discovered ? — None ! — All his 
domesticks, and many of his friends, have been arrested ; have 
pone of those suffered the secret to escape ? — None ! — All his pa- 
pers have been seized ; have none of those betrayed the features 
of this plot ?-r-None ! — Indeed ! What, then, is the nature of this 
very wonderful conspiracy, without associates, without witnesses, 
without evidence, without support, and, more than all, without 
conspirators ?— rrLearn from Roland ! 

Roland says that Pichegru, who intrigued for the royalists, not 
having been permitted to explain himself to Moreau, at their last 
interview, and seeing all his insinuations disregarded or repulsed, 
sent Roland to make the famous overture (we use his own words). 
It had not been previously made ; and, consequently, at this time 
Moreau had not been associated in their plans, as their confidence 
had not then been given to him. Roland adds that he made his 
proposition, and that Moreau absolutely refused to take part in any 
movement in behalf of the Bourbons. Moreau, therefore, is not 
guilty of any conspiracy whose object was the^r restoration. Ro-. 
land goes on to say, that, at the same time, Moreau proposed that 
IPichegru should change his plan, that he should first remove the 
consul and the governour of Paris, and then he, Moreau, wouldavail 
himself of a party in the senate to obtain the dictatorship, and 
would act according as opinion should direct, 

Roland at the trial, when pressed by his conscience, though he 
let one part of his former testimony remainV rescinded others. 
He there said that he did not understand the words the consuls and 
the governour of Paris must disappear^ as signifying a desire that 
they should be murdered j that Moreau speaking to him, on his 
pretensions to power or authority, had said, that before he could 
receive it, the consuls and all those possessed of publick dignity 
must be no more.— Judge now what credit should be given to a 
witness who is capable of varying his testimony on a point of such 
importance : and on what tenure do our best citizens hold their 
lives and honour, if they depend upon the construction which eve- 
ry wretch shall please to alSx to a real or imagined conversation. 

A conversation ! The very idea that a conversation, however, 
seditious it may be, could constitute the crime of high-treason, is 
repugnant to every principle of justice. Moreau is not reproached 
with havmg performed one single treasonable act. His conduct is 
ftt least pare, whatever his heart may be. He has taken no steps, 



[ 40 ] 

deduced none to be his accomplices, in this supposed plot. But, 
as we are assured by Roland, he spoke seditiously ; and we are 
to believe that Roland neither heard indistinctly, misapprehended^ 
nor forgot, any^ part of what Moreau may have said. Is the me- 
memory of anv man so rigidly tenacious as to be positive, aftey 
such a lapse of time, that such and such words were used in a con- 
versation ; that thev were used in the same order in which they 
are repeated ; that no modification, no inflexion, no accompanying 
lenitive, by escaping from recollection has distorted the meaning 
of the speaker. And, admitting them to have been spoken, shall 
the utterance of mere fugitive words send a man to the scaffold? 
No! the government under which we live, delighting only in 
justice, never can permit such a wide departure from it. No ! 
never, under this government, shall we hear of a citizen being 
condemned for the crime of words, on the unsupported word of a 
delator. But when this delator, besides being proved by the ac- 
cused to be a liar, is, according to every rule of judgment, a vile 
calumniator, the object of his calumny is much less exposed. We 
shall now out of his own mouth prove the falsehoods of Roland. 

If we believe this Roland, he Was the agent of a party of royal- 
ists. If from him Moreau received the confidence of Pichegru, 
he must have known that Pichegru acted in concert Avith Georges 
and his friends ; that is to say, in concert with the most resolved 
and faithful adherents of the house of Bourbon. And we are told 
that Moreau, in answer to the overtures made to him, whether by 
Roland or Pichegru, gave such a reply as this. — " I never will 
*' serve the princes of Bourbon* But let the royalists immediate- 
" ly proceed to execute their design. I will not mix in the broil. 
" I will wait its success. Let them kill the Consul and the Go- 
" vernour of Paris. And then, when the dgnger shall have passed 
" by, when every obstacle shall have been surmounted, when the 
*■'■ struggle shall have been crowned with success, when the royalists 
" shall be masters of the state, then, instead of proclaiming the king 
" for whose sake they devoted themselves, they shall renounce the 
" immediate object for M^hich the}'' incurred so great a risk, and; 
" they shall call upon me : I will then come forward to reap the 
" harvest of their toils and perils ; I will go to the Senate and declare 
" myself dictator !! I" Before this day, did ever an idea so full 
of folly enter the brain of a lunatick, as that of supposmg that all 
these pure royalists should, at once, in the hour of success, aban- 
don the cause of their- king, to become *hesoldiers; ofthe- Dictatqp 
Moreau!!! .ij'irio^ i: ^-.ih a-vla ■^nsv a^.i I :iohr^n^v^Cj A 

Roland offends still more against the laws of common sense than 
against those of truth, and cannot be believed in any of his decla- 
rations. In the shdck-of the two voices, that of the accused ought 



i ^ :3 

■to prevail, were it only because the testimony of Roland has vari- 
ed at different times. 

Another of his impositions is the declaration that Moreau boast- 
ed of a strong party in the Senate. Without noticing the injury 
he:|re done to the first constitutional feody in the state, we should 
deinand, if this were so, why do we not at this moment behold 
any^ of those unfaithful senators at the bar of this tribunal. 

B^t, we are asked, what interest could induce Roland to give 
false testimony ? 

^ The interest of Roland may be two-fold. In the first place it 
jnay be none other than that of a vile informer, who has denounced 
a fictitious crime to merit a substantial recompense. This suppo- 
sition will not appear unfounded, when we consider the species of 
complaisance which has been peculiarly shewn to him. All the 
other prisoners have been thrown into the cells of the Temple. He 
only, the systematick agent for corrupting Moreau and by conse- 
quence doubly offending, was lodged in the abbey. He only was 
allowed his counsel, and a free communication with his friends, 
both personally and by letters ; while neither the voice of a friend, 
nor the sigh of a relative, was permitted to penetrate the secret 
dungeons which almost excluded the others from the light of hea- 
ven. 

But if this supposition is erroneous, if he be really a conspirator^ 
his interest may be of a different nature, but not less powerful ; 
that of appeasing the violated majesty, and disarming the awful 
severity, of the law, by becoming a general informer. In one of the 
interrogatories, on his first examination, an idea of clemency was 
held out to him, and a distinction taken which would greatly soften 
his fate — -If you declare nothings say the ministers of justice to 
him, you xoill be looked upon as an accomvi.ice^- if you divulge 
the whole, you -will be considered merely as a confident. — What 
more was necessary to inspire a base and cowardly spirit with the 
hopes of saving himself at the expense of others ? to testify false- 
hoods where he knew the truth would not attain his purposes ? 

Roland is not only under accusation as an accomplice in the 
same crime, but he is fairly suspected of interested and sinister 
motives ; his evidence therefore ought not to be believed. 

He ought not to be believed, because his assertions are unsup- 
ported by any other authority or circumstance. 

He ought not to be believed, because probability and common- 
sense, in every instance, contradict his testiinony. 

He ought not to be believed, because fugitive words are too sus- 
ceptible of variation, for any one to be able to declare, with cer- 
tainty, that they have been delivered in the order reported, or 
with the arbitrary meaning attached to them. 

Consequently, all the proof of the conspiracy which Moreau is 



[ 42 3 

tharged with having contrived or approved, being found in the so- 
litary declaration of one in the predicament of Roland, Moreau 
ought to be absolved.! 



FIFTH CHARGE. 

MOREAU DID NOT DENOUNCE THE CONSPIRACY. 

Before a crime can be denounced, it is necessary that he froni 
whom the denunciation is expected, should be acquainted with 
all the facts which constitute it, the object intended by it, the 
means employed or ready to be employed to promote it, and the 
names of those who are to concur in the execution of it* 

The law punishes him as a libeller who denounces without 
proof, who cannot establish the offence which he alleges, who 
cannot ascertain the guilt of him whom he accuses* 

He who is to denounce is consequeully a judge of the offence 
which the law invites him to discover. 

If the offence is not manifest, if its circumstances are suspected 
but not ascertained, society can exact nothing concerning it fr®m 
the civism of its members. 

The question in the present case concerns a powerful conspiiacy 
against the state. 

Such a conspiracy cannot be said to exist until a number of indi- 
viduals have combined, and have communicated to each other 
their ideas, their hopes, and their wishes ; until they have diges- 
ted some plan for the execution of which each pledges himself to 
the whole ; in which each has his particular duty assigned him, so 
that their separate efforts may tend to one common issue ; in 
which every thing is organized, from the chief who directs, to the 
most subordinate agent who is to execute his orders, and obey his 
instructions. 

Generel Moreau had no knowledge of such a conspiracy. He 
had seen Pichegru and Roland. There was no witness of the con- 
versations between him and the former ; but he has sufficiently 
established the insignificance of the first. All we can learn from 
the second, is, that Pichegru may have wished, provided certain 
events not likely to happen should occur, to replace the ancient 
family of the Bourbons on the throne of France. 

But if he had formed a plan, had engaged associates, and was 
furnished with means, these he necessarily concealed when he 
discovered, on the very first hint, that Moreau'^s affections were 
so completely alienated from that family, that he refused to hear 
that there was even a possibility of their return to France. This 
vague insinuation, then, was all that Moreau knew of such a pro- 
ject, and knew thus much only to laugh at it as ridiculous and ex- 
travagant. 



[ 43 ] 

Roland, even Roland confesses that on the 17th Pltiviose he did 
not disclose more : he does not say that any plan of conspiracy 
Vfa.s confided to Moreau. 

If thus ill instructed, and not wishing, not having the power, to 
be more minutely informed, Moreau had stepped forward as an 
accuser, what would have been the consequence ? Pichegru would 
either have escaped from Paris, or he would have been apprehend- 
ed. In the first case the denunciation would have been ineffectual, 
and he would have been again censured as the tardy discoverer of 
the enemy of the state ; in the second, Pichegru, denying every 
thing, and nothing being found to support the charge against him, 
then Moreau, failmg in the proof of what he had alleged, would, 
in the contemplation of law, have been branded as a libeller. 

Let us by way of hypothesis, although allowing a scope for rea- 
soning which cannot be e3<acted from us, enlarge for a moment 
the sphere of the intelligence communicated to Moreau, and sup- 
pose thathe w^as itfade fully acquainted with the complete organi- 
zation of a conspiracy, and knew the approaching moment ap- 
pointed for its execution. Then, you will no doubt say, Moreau 
would have failed in the duty which society imposes on each of. its 
members, had he not immediately discovered to the constituted 
authorities, the gulph that was yawning for their destruction^ 

His silence might have shewn him to be a careless citizen ; but 
would he have been a criminal for whom the law reserved a chas- 
tisement ?— ^No. 

We refer to the Penal Code of the 2lst of September 1791 ; we 
open the Code of Crimes and Punishments of the 3d Brumaire 
year 4; and in the multiplied series of punishments reserved for each 
species of offence or crime, we find nothing which ranks this 
amongst the acts of conspiracy, consequently nothing that can pu- 
nish it as such. The not revealing a crime within your knowledge, 
whatever may be its nature, receives there no qualification, has 
there no place assigned to it. 

Yet these two laws constitute the whole of our penal legislation. 
Since their promulgation nothing has been known as a crime but 
what has been rendered such by some overt act. And every ac- 
tion which is not there defined, can but receive publick reprehen- 
sion. Opinion may condemn but the law has no power to judge it 

Nor is it of any consequence though some ancient law may have 
given to an act the character of a crime ; if the new code, more in- 
dulgent and more wise, has not particularly declared it to be so the 
act is no longer criminal. 

Such is the dictum of our penal code. 

If the act rendered criminal by the ancient statutes, is recogniz- 
ed by the present code, the accused who shall be found guilty of 
it, shall suffer the penalties of the present code ; which has, in 

G 



[ 44 ] 

express terms, declared that all crimes indicated by anteriour laws, 
and not therein renewed in that sense, shall cease to be such. 

Or, which is perfectly synonymous, or even more simple, as 
cited above, there can be no other crimes nor punishments than 
those expressly designated by the present code — And, consequent- 
ly, by not permitting any punishment except such as it has ap- 
pointed, it abrogates all those which may have been known before 
it existed, 

To turn over a single folio of the ancient statutes, with a view to 
discover a law which inflicts on those who do not denounce a con- 
spiracy, the same penalties incurred by the conspirator, is, there- 
fore, inadmissible. 

We know perfectly well that such law vf as enacted, in 1477, by 
Louis XI, the most suspicious ofthe Kings of France. 

We also know that Cardinal Richelieu availed himself of thiis 
law in order to gratify his revenge in the process against the un- 
fortunate De Thou : a process which, in recalling the execrated 
name of Laubardemont, recalls also the long train of hoiTOurs of 
which he was the minister. 

But of what consequence is such a law, long since, after one so- 
litary application, buried in oblivion. Never was it restored, ne- 
ver confirmed, bj^any successor of Louis XI, ■ 

Neither the celebrated ordinance of 1539, fabricated by the 
chancellor Puget, for the sole purpose of compassrng the death of 
admiral Chabot ; nor the ordinance of Orleans and of Blois ; nor 
any other ordinance subsequent to 1477, are disgraced by a simi- 
lar provision. 

We should not at this time possess a special legislation, em- 
bracing every case, and authorising no other punishments than 
those v/hich it provides, had it not been from the fear that-, under 
a government whose lav^s were established upon the dispositions, 
and adapted to the manners of the people, and which had given a 
civil code to France, some chance might have renewed the power 
of a sanguinary edict, which the neglect of centuries had senten- 
ced to an eternal silence, and whose single application has been 
pursued by the execration of posterity. The revival of such au- 
thority, it was justly perceived, would have been disgraceful to 
the reign of Libert}'' and the Empire of law. 

In not denouncing the conspiracy even had he known its ex- 
istence, general Moreau would not hav^ offended against any law, 
and consequently would have incurred no penalty. As it was un* 
known to him that such a plot di^ exist, to denounce it was 
impossible, and to punish him for ignorance would be unjust and 
impolitick. 

In terminating this melancholy task we may be perniitted to re- 
turn to one part of the accusation, and to discharge ourselves of a 



[ 45 ] 

burthen that has pressed heavily upon our heart, from the first 
moment when this defence engaged our attention. 

Moreau is accused of having aimed at possessing the supreme 
power ; of having plotted against the life of the emperour ! 

No : by honour and by fame we swear, Moreau cannot be 
guilty I He knew too well the horrours of a revolution ever to be 
himself the author of a new one ! He knew that blind, devouring, 
and remorseless, monster ; which, while he was shedding on his 
country glory and renown, at the moment when victory was 
crowning him on the field of battle, brought under the guillotine 
the head of his venerable father ! No : Moreau never could de- 
sire the ruin of that country, in which, as long as it exists, his 
name can never be pronounced but with praise and gratitude ! He 
who never discovered the most latent spark of ambition when pos- 
sessed of the power of gratifying it, cannot be supposed to entertain 
the desire of rule now, when deprived of all the means of accom- 
plishing his views ! He who never harboured a jealous thought 
against those rivals whom a weak and mistaken government prefer- 
red to command over him, could not envy the rank of that privi- 
leged genius whom providence seems to have peculiarly designed 
t-o be the regulator of impires ; under whom every place is a place 
of splendour! whilst all the nations and sovereigns of Europe sue 
for the alliance of Buonaparte, can it be supposed that an idea of 
displacing him could enter the mind of a man, who, whatever may 
have been his opinion of the form of government, has incontesti- 
bly proved, during twelve years, his unobstruive obedience to the 
national will ! He who yielded implicitly to the command of Sche- 
rer, of Joubert, and of Macdonald, could never consider himself 
disgraced by submitting to their chief. 

POSTSCRIPT. 

Many arguments: which would of themselves, remove far from 
general Moreau all ground of accusation, have been omitted. We 
v/ill here enumerate one or two of those. 

We have already made apparent, in the memoir and in the plead- 
ings, the perfect inoffensiveness of the relations between Moreau 
and the Abbe David : their connexion is fully justified in the let- 
ter written by the former to the latter. We have explained the 
conduct of the general on the occurrences preceding the 18th 
Fructidor. We have brought into view his sentiments on the con- 
i^uct of Pichegru, in remaining among the enemies of France dur- 
ing the three last campaigns: and his subsequent generous decla- 
ration that so far from his being an obstacle to the return of Piche- 
gru, he would gladly co-operate in obtaining his full pardon, so far 
as his aid could be serviceable. 

The eyes of those must be shut against light who refuse to 



[ 46 ] 

be convinced that in all this there is nothing participating in the 
nature of a conspiracy : but on the contrary the true characterise 
ticks of a good man ; attachment and love of his country, compass 
sion and friendship for the unhappy. 

But the innocence of these relations has been still more clearly- 
demonstrated, by the declaration of David, who says that he ex- 
plained his intention of reconciling Moreau and Pichegru, and of 
obtaining, if possible, liberty for the latter to return to France, to 
several distinguished generals and citizens, who are far out of the 
reach of suspicion, and that he proceeded by their advice ; and by 
its being proved that the words, "• if you could bring me but one 
." line from our friend, it would be a great pleasure to me," which 
are found in one of the letters from Pichegru to David, have no 
reference to Moreau, but to a Senator who authorised us to plead 
this fact in his name ; and to add that he sent the line desired by 
Pichegru, to his old companion in misfortune j his letter was 
found amongst the papers of David. 

Another, and more important point is that resting on the word 
of Roland : whose villanous imposture is evident in every part of 
that horrid design which he attributes to Moreau. 

The improbability, the palpable falsehood, the total impossibility 
of the fact, prove it to be the fabrication of Roland. But the loy- 
al and generous soul of Moreau has been so deeply wounded by 
the mere allegation, that we must, in his farther justification, ex- 
plain a circumstance barely touched upon in the memoir, and 
which must divest the testimony of Roland of all claim to belief. 

The interrogatory* which procured the reply of Roland contain- 
ing the words imputed to general Moreau, and the reply itself 
must be compared, in order to shew how naturally the one follows 
the other, and is derived from it : how impossible it was for Ro- 
land not to seize on a mean of safety which he believed he saw pre- 
sented to him 5 how very probable it is that Roland had in the first 
place ofiered to purchase that safety by atrociously vilifying Mo- 
reau. 

To a first question on the subject of a conference related by Pi- 
chegru to Roland, he replied, that " Some time had passed since 
" that conversation took place, and he could not be certain that his 
" memory had faithfully retained what was then said — he might 
"• be deceived." 

Then follows an interrogatory which occupies three pages of the 
examination, in which he is told that every thing he had done and* 
said v/as known, that his conversations vv^ith Pichegru v/ere over- 
heard ; that his apartment -was so contrived that, notwithstanding 
every precaution, the secret had been betrayed ; it then concludes 



* E.xainination of Pvolar-d, 2Cth Pluviossj bsfore the Courxsellor of State, Real,- 



[47 ] 

in these words — " Beware, lest, in continuing silent, you conceal 
^' from the ear of Justice any one of the facts which she ought to 
" know, and thereby force us to believe that you are not merely 
" the confident but the accomplice oi those men whom she pursues. 
*' I invite you, then, to speak more ingenuously, and to discover 
*' not only all that Pichegru said to you, but all that passed between 
*' you and Moreau, at whose house it will be proved that you 
•' were the second day after Pichegru came to lodge with you. 
" We heard you speak of this visit by the same means : you told 
" Pichegru that Moreau had a large party in the Senate ; that he, 
" Moreau, was at the head of a design against the first consul and 
" the governour of Paris, in which the Bourbons were interested. 
" — I summons you, therefore, to declare the whole truth, con- 
" cerning these conferences and the object connected with them.'* 

It was in reply to this question, thus concluded, that Roland, 
who a moment before feared that " he might be deceived," who 
apprehended " the infidelity of his memory," found all at once a 
perfect recollection, put to flight all silly scruples, and followed the 
path so ingeniously chalked out for him. It was then, that the 
hope of being considered only as a confident and not as an accom- 
plice, induced him to give birth to those nefarious falsehoods, and 
particularly to testify that Moreau had spoken of a strong party in 
the Senate, by which he could obtain the supreme power, but that 
:the first consul, &c. &c. must first disappear. 

Who does not immediately see in the correlation between this 
question and its answer, how destitute of credibility it leaves this 
frightful assertion of Roland, who until then had said nothing, but 
who from his intimacy with Pichegru, from having lodged him in 
i ■ his house, and from other circumstances, believing that he had 
" every thing to fear for himself, seized with alacrity on the hope 
held out to him in the question, of escaping punishment as an ac- 
cornplice. He had only to lie and be saved; it required but little de- 
liberation to decide. Independent, then, of his situation of co- 
accused, of his declaration being unsupported by any other proof, 
which alone would annul it, it is destroyed by the very means ta- 
ken to obtain it, by the predicament in which he was placed, and 
the hope that be might purchase his own life, by infamously and 
falsely swearing away the life and honour of another. 

Let us dive a little deeper. Who had previously disclosed the 
circumstances which appear in this interrogatory ? — It was either 
some other witness, or it was Roland himself. — If another, why 
has not that other been brought forward ? why was he not heard at 
the trial ? — If it was Roland, which is the most probable supposi- 
tion, then it is plain that he had basely trafficked his character for 
his life, in promising the disclosures which he pretended to make ; 



[48] 

and that he afterwards invented that salutary perjury, in which he 
had the courage to persevere. 

Any thing more would be superabundant. Roland only affirms 
to the charge : Moreau solemnly denies it. — Roland stands under a 
criminal accusation, and, according to every principle and every 
avithority, his evidence is inadmissible ; it can neither be allowed 
to prove, nor even to cause a suspicion of guilt. 

It has been said that Moreau wished to possess himself of power. 
His character, his habits of life, his total retirement from publick 
view, his being entirely unacquainted with men in place, the cir- 
cumstance that not one person with whom he has any intimacy has 
been accused, and the difficulty of believing that he could hope to 
obtain it by the assistance of the Bourbons, or their fanatick parti- 
zans, all unite to annihilate this absurd charge. 

Where now is that man, tn whose breast there is either 

JUSTICE or impartiality, WHO CAN RESIST SUCH CLEAR DEMON- 
STRATIONS OF INNOCENCE ? WHO CAN NOW LAY HIS HAND ON HIS 
HE4iRT AND SAY GENERAL MoREAU IS GUILTY I 

Signed by the Counsellors at Law. 

BONNET. 

BELLART. 

PERIGNON. 



H 



